Congratulations David Payne

I didn't get a chance to see this live but congratulations to David Payne for his bronze medal finish in the 110 hurdles.

As you can see from the finish he was a chin away from Gold.

David, you did UC proud.

It's a matter of trust

Solving problems by creating others

Riddle me this Batman.

In order to correct the trillion dollar unfunded Medicare debacle we need to add another trillion dollar health care debacle? Huh?

But that's how the Obamunists solve problems, borrow money to pay off money we've already borrowed or plan to borrow and somehow we all end up richer for it.

Another classic Steyn analysis.......

But the silver-tongued salesman sails on. Why be scared of a government health program? After all, says the president, "Medicare is a government program that works really well," and if "we're able to get something right like Medicare," we should have more "confidence" about being able to do it for everyone.

On the other hand, says the president, Medicare is "unsustainable" and "running out of money."

By the way, unlike your run-of-the-mill politician's contradictory statements, these weren't made a year or even a week apart, but during the same presidential speech in Portsmouth, N.H. At any rate, in order to "control costs," Obama says we need to introduce a new trillion-dollar government entitlement. It's a good thing he's the smartest president of all time and the greatest orator since Socrates because otherwise one might easily confuse him with some birdbrained Bush type. But, if we take him at his word, then a trillion-dollar public expenditure that "controls costs" presumably means he's planning on reducing private health expenditure – such as, say, your insurance plan – by at least a trillion. Or he'll be raising a trillion dollars' worth of revenue. Either way, under Obama nothing is certain but death panels and taxes – i.e., a vast enervating statism and the confiscation of the fruits of your labors required to pay for it.

That's why the "stimulus" flopped. It didn't just fail to stimulate, it actively deterred stimulation, because it was the first explicit signal to America and the world that the Democrats' political priorities overrode everything else. If you're a business owner, why take on extra employees when cap-and-trade is promising increased regulatory costs, and health "reform" wants to stick you with an 8 percent tax for not having a company insurance plan? Obama's leviathan sends a consistent message to business and consumers alike: When he's spending this crazy, maybe the smart thing for you to do is hunker down until the dust's settled, and you get a better sense of just how broke he's going to make you. For this level of "community organization," there aren't enough of "the rich" to pay for it. That leaves you.

More.....

Progressives "Cheneyed" by The One

HT to Norma

Social networking

I'm still catching up on the social networking gig.

So far, I've found Twitter to be absolutely worthless. I'm still trying to figure out how to most effectively utilize Facebook, My Space and Linked In.

Frankly, much of what my "friends" are posting on Facebook is crap. I really don't see the need to post my whereabouts 24/7.

I did break down and put my Facebook link on the blog if you'd like to be my "friend". If you are someone who uses these sites for something worthwhile, clue me in. What am I missing? I'd like to use these for something worthwhile, but i'm not sure what that exactly looks like.

Please help me in the comment section.

"Progressives" can't deal with real science

I continue to be amazed at how quick "progressives" are to believe in the faux science of global warming yet seem to have no grasp of real science like the LAW of supply and demand.

In addition, there is more than overwhelming evidence that socialism doesn't work in so many ways. Take the socialist paradise of California. Does it appear that oasis of progressive thinking is working?

The WSJ has an article noting the more socialized the economy, the more difficulty they are having in this recession..........

Proponents of Big Government can't say we avoided the next Great Depression due to hypothetical stimulus money that is mostly unspent. So they argue it's more important that the federal government merely continued spending and didn't "slash" spending as in the early 1930s. But the federal government didn't slash spending in the early '30s. Federal spending rose by 6.2% in 1930, 7.7% in 1931 and 30.2% in 1932. Since prices were falling, real increases in federal spending were huge during the Hoover years.

President Obama clearly believes Big Government is the antidote to this and perhaps all recessions. At his first news conference in February, the president said, "The federal government is the only entity left with the resources to jolt our economy back to life." Yet that raises a key question: If the U.S. economy could not recover without a big "jolt" of deficit spending, then how did the economy recover from recessions in the distant past, when the federal government was very small?

A 1999 study in The Journal of Economic Perspectives by Christina Romer (now head of the Council of Economic Advisers) found that "real macroeconomic indicators have not become dramatically more stable between the pre-World War I and post-World War II eras, and recessions have become only slightly less severe." Ms. Romer also noted that "recessions have not become noticeably shorter" in the era of Big Government. In fact, she found the average length of recessions from 1887 to 1929 was 10.3 months. If the current recession ended in August, then the average postwar recession lasted one month longer—11.3 months. The longest recession from 1887 to 1929 lasted 16 months. But there have been three recessions since 1973 that lasted at least that long.

So once again I throw out the challenge to the "progressives" out there. If liberal policies are so great, why is Detroit such a shit hole?

We want these guys to run health care? #41

Cash for clunkers once again...........

For all the program's acclaim, the $3 billion economic stimulus effort is causing headaches locally for car dealers as well as buyers, who can get up to $4,500 off their purchase by handing over older, less-fuel-efficient vehicles.

The federal government has been slow to process the tens of thousands of clunker applications nationally, and that's creating a series of hang-ups.

Like Faulk, many other buyers have yet to receive their new cars, as dealers hold out to receive clunker funding — even though withholding a car is in violation of a federal government directive.

Other buyers are getting their cars, but dealers are presenting them with agreements to pay back the dealership if clunker funding is rejected. That, too, is wrong, the federal government says.

Do you want to know why dealers are doing this.

Reader Tim passed along a story he heard about a dealership who did all the CARS paperwork only to have the feds withhold $2,200 of the $4,500 because the car buyer had an outstanding tax lien.

How in the hell is a dealer supposed to know of an outstanding tax lien, back child support or a delinquent student loan subject to a refund confiscation?

The Federal Government.....
You want something screwed up, we're your guys.

more......

"We are God’s partners in matters of life and death.”

Kind of funny how we're "God's partners" except when it comes to abortion then it's above his paygrade.

Doesn't sound all that partner like to me.

The single payer system for college

So the way Obamacare plans to help health care is to offer more competition by offering a government plan.

How did that work in the education arena?

The WSJ with the results..............

Democrats are planning to use the autumn budget reconciliation to bring America further down the road to a single-payer system—and not just in health care. Responding to a White House request, pending House legislation would make the federal government the dominant lender in the $100 billion market for student loans.

Not that Congress has traditionally kept its hands off this business. As in health care, intervention in the education market has gone hand-in-hand with rising costs. While government accounts for 41% of health-care spending, the feds guarantee or issue roughly 80% of student loans, subsidizing the rates and also offering a slew of grant programs. Not by coincidence, higher education costs have risen much faster even than in the health-care market. From 1982 through 2007, college tuition and fees increased 439% in nominal dollars, almost triple the rise in median family income, according to the National Center for Public Policy and Higher Education.

Now the plan is to squeeze out what remains of the private market. Until now, there were three options for students needing to borrow for college: private loans, government loans and loans made by private lenders but guaranteed by the government. The plan for the fall is to outlaw this last category—more than half the current market—while tightening the noose around the small share that remains free and poses no threat to taxpayers. Simply put, we are watching in student loans exactly what ObamaCare's harshest critics have forecast for health care: a "public option" that ultimately destroys all competition.

The cold hard truth. The more money we make available to kids for education, the more money the education leaches suck out of the students.

Lately, I've commented to the lovely Mrs. Gekko about the proliferation of all these "colleges" who've set up a campuses in suburban office parks. They're everywhere.

Here's some of these office park schools who advertise degrees in pajamas.....

Chatfield College
Brown Macke Collage
Antonelli College
Kaplan College
Southwestern College
National College
Ashland University
Mt. Vernon Nazarene
Daymar College
Miami Jacobs College
Galen College
Indiana Wesleyan

Ask yourself the question. Why is it that these schools are jumping up all over God's creation?

Of course, to many questions, if you answer money, you're normally correct 95% of the time. And in this case you would also be correct. These guys know there's lot's of student loan and Pell grant money to extract from any ding dong with a high school diploma.

The end result is a poorly prepared "college graduate" and a school who's pocketed lot's of money.

Even the traditional schools understand that people will seek out a college education for their kids and will pay "X" for the privilege. Adding government money to the mix never changes the "X" for the parent/student.

So while liberals are still looking to take over our medical establishment. How about cleaning up the messes you've already created out there.

Tea Party Rally

Meet the Gekko's at the next Tea Party Rally.

Let's get thousands out there.

Particulars.........

The Cincinnati Tea Party presents the Voice of America. More details to follow...

Vitals

Date: September 5, 2009

Time: 1:00pm - 6:00pm

Location: Voice of America Park, West Chester Ohio

We are in need of volunteered services as well and donations to make this event a success. Please email info@cincinnatiteaparty.org if you would be able to volunteer a service.
Thanks in advance for your continued support!

RSVP for the Event here!

Thursday humor

From reader Steve

Guy goes into a bar, there's a robot bartender. The robot says, "What will you have?" The guy says, "Martini." The robot brings back the best martini ever and says to the man, "What's your IQ?" The guy says, "168". The robot then proceeds to talk about physics, space exploration and medical technology.

The guy leaves, but he is curious, so he goes back into the bar. The robot bartender says, "What will you have?" The guy says, "Martini". Again, the robot makes a great martini, gives it to the man and says, "What's your IQ?" The guy says, "100." The robot then starts to talk about Nascar, Budweiser and John Deere tractors.

The guy leaves, but finds this very interesting, so he thinks he will try it one more time. He goes back into the bar. The robot says, "What will you have?" The guy says, "Martini", and the robot brings him another great martini. The robot then says, "What's your IQ?" The guy says, "Uh, about 50."

The robot leans in real close and says, "So, you people still happy you voted for Obama?"

I'm still waiting for some of those viral liberal jokes that pass amongst "progressives". If you have one, pass it along.

PS Bush = Hitler = not a joke

MSNBC: Gun-Toting Protesters are 'White' Racists... Black Guy with AR-15 Edited to Conceal his Race.

Why does college cost so much?

After you watch this, you'll wonder why liberals aren't calling for college education reforms. Oh, never mind.

Greenpeace Leader Admits Arctic Ice Exaggeration

Why I'm a conservative #41

Because when I was about 27, I understood something that a labor leader is just now starting to get.....

Trumka's remarks were echoed privately by several other labor officials at the convention in Pittsburgh. In particular, the emerging Senate FinanceCommittee plan - which seems unlikely to contain a public option and could end up taxing pricey health care packages - seems almost guaranteed to incite the unions.

"We'll oppose it," Trumka said, when asked about any bill that ends the tax exemption for employer coverage. "It's actually a stupid concept because if you tax those that have it to pay for those that don't, eventually those that have [benefits] won't. Then who do you ultimately tax?" [emphasis added]

More....

Single payer health care at work

It's not the death squads you have to worry about when it comes to government health care. With government health care, you'll probably die before you even get to a hospital.

From England........

A young mother gave birth on a pavement outside a hospital after she was told to make her own way there.

Mother-of-three Carmen Blake called her midwife to ask for an ambulance when she went into labour unexpectedly with her fourth child.

But the 27-year-old claims she was refused an ambulance and told to walk the 100m from her house in Leicester to the city's nearby Royal Infirmary.

Her daughter Mariah was delivered on a pavement outside the hospital by a passer-by, just before ambulance crews arrived.

Today the Trust that runs the hospital said it would look into any complaint made about the advice and care the 27-year-old received.

Ms Blake said she started going into labour at about 7.15am on Sunday, August 2.

She said: "I phoned up the Royal Infirmary, it's just across the road, and they said to go into a hot bath, and then to make my way over there.

"I went into the bath and realised she was going to come quickly. I didn't think I'd be able to make it out of the bath, so I phoned the maternity ward back and told them to get an ambulance out.

'They said they were not sending an ambulance and told me I had had nine months to sort out a lift.'

More......

You want these guys to run health care?

So now we know that the federal government cannot even competently reimburse dealerships for simply buying junk cars.......

Hundreds of auto dealers in the New York area have withdrawn from the government's Cash for Clunkers program, citing delays in getting reimbursed by the government, a dealership group said Wednesday.

The Greater New York Automobile Dealers Association, which represents dealerships in the New York metro area, said about half its 425 members have left the program because they cannot afford to offer more rebates. They're also worried about getting repaid.

"(The government) needs to move the system forward and they need to start paying these dealers," said Mark Schienberg, the group's president. "This is a cash-dependent business."

The program offers up to $4,500 to shoppers who trade in vehicles getting 18 mpg or less for a more fuel-efficient car or truck. Dealers pay the rebates out of pocket, then must wait to be reimbursed by the government. But administrative snags and heavy paperwork have created a backlog of unpaid claims.

Schienberg said the group's dealers have been repaid for only about 2 percent of the clunkers deals they've made so far.

These guys are making the FEMA handling of Katrina look like a well oiled machine.

More......

Animal Farm

A great piece placing the Obamunists right inside the text of Animal Farm......

I read the various articles and blogs concerning the Obama administration seemingly backing off the public option requirement under proposed healthcare legislation. I was reminded of one particular scene from George Orwell’s Animal Farm in which Squealer (think White House spokesman Robert Gibbs) explains to the animals (the White House press pool) why Napoleon (President Obama) pulled a 180 on the building of the windmill originally proposed by the banished Snowball:

“That evening Squealer [Gibbs] explained privately to the other animals that Napoleon [Obama] had never in reality been opposed to the windmill. On the contrary, it was he who had advocated it in the beginning, and the plan which Snowball had drawn on the floor of the incubator shed had actually been stolen from among Napoleon’s [Obama’s] papers. The windmill was, in fact, Napoleon’s [Obama’s] own creation. Why, then, asked somebody, had he spoken so strongly against it? Here Squealer [Gibbs] looked very sly. That, he said, was Comrade Napoleon’s [Obama’s] cunning. He had SEEMED to oppose the windmill, simply as a maneuver to get rid of Snowball, who was a dangerous character and a bad influence. Now that Snowball was out of the way, the plan could go forward without his interference. This, said Squealer, was something called tactics. He repeated a number of times, “Tactics, comrades, tactics!” skipping round and whisking his tail with a merry laugh. The animals were not certain what the word meant, but Squealer [Gibbs] spoke so persuasively, and the three dogs who happened to be with him growled so threateningly, that they accepted his explanation without further questions.”

More.....

What's this guy smoking?

I'm getting a little sick of all the ding dongs out there who voted for Obama and now have second thoughts. Like this clown..........

Ryan Tang is a young Republican who voted for Barack Obama last fall. He liked Mr. Obama’s talk of bipartisanship. He thought he was someone – finally – who would work with Republicans and Democrats.

But today, just six months into the president’s term, Mr. Tang is having buyer’s remorse. He doesn’t think Obama has lived up to his rhetoric. He’s worried about the country veering away from the core principles he believes in: free markets, smaller government, less regulation. Thus he’s now inclined to support a candidate with more managerial brio even if he or she is not particularly “cool” – a Republican like former Massachusetts Gov. Mitt Romney or former eBay CEO Meg Whitman.

“And those people aren’t hip,” says Tang, a recent college graduate who works for a consulting firm in Washington, D.C.

So Ryan, what in Obama's brief history as anything would have led you to believe that he would govern in a bipartisan way?

Was it his work as an ACORN rep? We all know they are bipartisan.

Maybe it was his work as a state senator where he voted with his party 99% of the time?

Or his three votes in the US senate where he voted the democratic line a perfect 100%?

While I'm being overly harsh on young Ryan here, I actually blame the media for allowing Obama to cast himself as some sort of moderate when his one page resume showed nothing of the sort.

Much like the way he flat out lies about the health care debate today where he claims that he's never been a proponent of a "public option" when You Tube is littered with videos of him saying just that.

Will the traditional media outlets continue to just let this guy say whatever the hell he wants without a challenge or will someone finally show some balls and tell the emperor he has no clothes?

More......

Life in "Progress" City

From the city of Paterson, NJ, who hasn't had a conservative run the city since Plato was a hot weekend ticket......

Seeking to curb violence after a spate of deadly summer shootings, Paterson officials are considering an unusual ordinance that would prevent people of all ages from gathering outside in public late at night.

The measure could be the nation's first citywide, non-emergency curfew to include adults, several experts said.

"We're trying to think outside the box," said Mayor Jose Torres. "This was triggered predominantly by fear among city residents over the shootings that have been occurring this summer."

A 29-year-old Paterson man was gunned down in his car last week in the latest chapter of a tit-for-tat battle between rival groups, according to police who decline to describe them as gangs. The battle has generated community fear, even though overall shootings and violence remain low by historical standards.

Out here in Redville we already have a curfew, albeit self imposed, we call it going to work the next morning.

What's so "progressive" about Paterson NJ.

More.....

Where's the Obama we elected?

Don't count me as part of the we but here's a piece from a supporter of Mr. Hope and Change....

Where have you gone, Barack Obama? Where is the sunny-side-up young man who promised to inspire and unite an unhappy nation?

Gone into the partisan sinkhole of Washington, that's where. Like some novice swimmer too confident of his own ability, Obama is suddenly finding himself in water over his head.

His flailing, including a foul habit of demonizing dissent, is not pretty. And that brief foray into e-mail tracking of critics showed a win-at-any-cost side.

Where is the appealing man we elected? Where is that Barack Obama?

Let's find him quick because the whole nation is paying the price for this impostor's irrational exuberance. Or hubris.

Read more: http://www.nydailynews.com/opinions/2009/08/19/2009-08-19_health_care_debate_confirms_this_is_not_the_barack_we_elected.html#ixzz0Od1Nu2PY

What if this were Bush?

Apparently, David Axelrod has a real chummy relationship with Halliburton, I mean, the lobbying firm representing Big Pills...........

The allegations in this Bloomberg story --if true-- pose a huge problem for a senior advisor to the president, David Axelrod. This is the heart of the problem:

Axelrod was president and sole shareholder of AKPD from 1985 until he sold his interest after Obama’s victory, government records show. The firm owes Axelrod $2 million, which it’s due to pay in installments beginning Dec. 31. Axelrod’s son, Michael, still works there. He didn’t return a phone call. The firm’s Web site continues to feature David Axelrod’s work on the Obama campaign. (Emphasis added.)

The problem is that Axelrod's former firm is currently receiving huge fees "from Healthy Economy Now, a coalition that includes the Washington-based Pharmaceutical Research & Manufacturers of America, known as PhRMA," as well as AARP, the SEIU and other big players in the health care debate.

If Axelrod has been negotiating any part of any deal involving any of these players which are funneling money to the firm that owes him money, or if he is advising the president on the deals with any of these groups, that's a conflict of interest. Laundering the money through a "coalition" doesn't remove the conflict much less the appearance of impropriety. The coalition is in effect partially funding David Axelrod's severance package though its members might have done so unknowingly. These forthcoming payments to Axelrod are much more significant than the sort of "retained ties" that Democrats blasted Dick Cheney for vis-a-vis Halliburton even though there was no high level negotiations between the vice president and his former company.

David Axelrod has some tough questions to answer, and according to Politico's Mike Allen, Politico's Ken Vogel will be publishing more on matters Axelrodian tomorrow. (Thetranscript of my interview with Allen will be posted here later tonight.) Vogel's story on Axelrod's son from a few days back casts doubt on the Bloomberg story's accuracy as Bloomberg has Axelrod's son still at Axelrod's old firm, but Vogel has him at The Huffington Post.

Read more here and here

Is Jon Stewart on the "fishy" list?

The Daily Show With Jon Stewart	Mon - Thurs 11p / 10c
Heal or No Heal - Medicine Brawl
www.thedailyshow.com
Daily Show Full Episodes Political Humor Healthcare Protests

A liberal tells the truth for a change

Bob Beckel comes clean on Obamacare tort reform; or the lack of it.

Universal healthcare has been our fight for 50 years. It is ingrained in our DNA and we are close. There are no guarantees, but Democrats offering tort reform will confound the Republicans, take away one of their most potent arguments, and put us back on the offensive. If that means throwing some trial lawyers under the bus, so be it.

Why haven't we talked about tort reform during this entire debate? Because we haven't wanted to bite one of the biggest hands that feed us. That substantial and legitimate disagreement over the effects of medical malpractice awards on health care costs is another. And there is our child-like fear the trail lawyers will abandon us.

On that last point let me be brutally pragmatic. The trail lawyers won't abandon us because they have nowhere else to go. As a trail lawyer friend admitted to me, "I hate to lose medical malpractice, but there's a whole lot of suing to do out there that has nothing to do with doctors". And that's the point. We're not talking about massive tort reform. We're not taking tobacco and asbestos of the table. We're talking a cap on punitive damages.

Trust me, I'm all for throwing tort lawyers under the bus, literally. But what does Beckel's statement above say about the costs of litigation to all other American companies doing business in the States.

Basically, we have a legalized extortion racket in this country and he's proposing that they give up some extortion for the common good.

We're talking tort lawyers here. Good luck on that.


Read the rest of this and get pissed.....

Obamanomics 101

So is the Big O ignorant or lying about the economics of his public option?.........

Impromptu Obamanomics is getting scarier by the day. For all the president’s touted intelligence, his un-teleprompted comments reveal a basic misunderstanding of capitalist principles.

For example, asked at the Portsmouth town hall how private insurance companies can compete with the government, the president said the following:

“If the private insurance companies are providing a good bargain, and if the public option has to be self-sustaining -- meaning taxpayers aren’t subsidizing it, but it has to run on charging premiums and providing good services and a good network of doctors, just like any other private insurer would do -- then I think private insurers should be able to compete.”

Self-sustaining? The public option? What has Obama been doing during those daily 40-minute economic briefings coordinated by uber-economic-adviser, Larry Summers?

Capitalism Explained

Government programs aren’t self-sustaining by definition. They’re subsidized by the taxpayer. If they were self-financed, we’d be off the hook.

Llewellyn Rockwell Jr., chairman of the Ludwig von Mises Institute in Auburn, Alabama, and editor of LewRockwell.com, put it this way in an Aug. 13 commentary on Mises.org:

“The only reason for a government service is precisely to provide financial support for an operation that is otherwise unsustainable, or else there would be no point in the government’s involvement at all.”

Rockwell sees no “economic reason for a government postal system” and would abolish it.

Read the whole thing.......

You want these people to have your medical records?

A fifth State Department worker has been convicted of snooping into the passport files of famous Americans.

Kevin Young, a 22-year veteran of the State Department from Temple Hills, Md., pleaded guilty Monday to illegally accessing more than 125 confidential passport applications for celebrities, professional athletes and a politician.

An investigation began in March 2008 after officials discovered unauthorized access of the files for then-presidential candidates Barack Obama, John McCain and Hillary Rodham Clinton.

But then again maybe we would find out about all those STD's Bill Clinton's walking around with.......

More....

The California infection spreads

To the state of Oregon who apparently too close to he California forest to see the bankruptcy trees..........

In short, California is whistling past the graveyard, hoping that its economy will rebound, "because it always has."

Key symptoms of California disease are forgetting that quality of life begins with a job and negative domestic migration.

With all the influx of Californians, it's not surprising that Oregon shows some signs of California disease. It recently increased its tax rates so that Oregon's highest-income taxpayers face marginal tax rates that match Hawaii's for the highest in the nation. Oregon's land-use planning had been extremely centralized for some time. Indeed, Oregon's land-use planning may be the most centralized in the United States. This makes it harder for communities to control their own destinies, whether they want to grow or not.

If Oregon does have California disease, the malady is surely not as advanced as it is in California. Oregon has lower gasoline taxes and lower property taxes than California. Oregon, in contrast with California, enjoys net positive domestic migration. It is also a good sign that a significant percentage of the people moving to Oregon from California are young folks. While it seems to many that the typical California immigrant is a wealthy aging baby boomer, the data show that he (or she) is still most likely a young person in his 20s or 30s, and often married with children. They are people who, if the economy grew, could have something to contribute to the economy as well as the cultural development of the state.

But Oregon's relationship with California remains a double-edged sword. On the one hand, Oregon has benefited from the inflow of cash and skilled workers. On the other hand, Oregon's relationship with California has led to the current situation where at 12.2 percent for the month of June, Oregon has one of the highest unemployment rates in the United States.

Oregon may be at a crossroads. The state is richly endowed with many of the components of a high quality of life. People want to live in Oregon, and they are moving to Oregon even in hard times. Yet as the population swells, there's no concurrent growth in businesses and employment. Over time, this could pose serious problems. Remember, quality of life begins with a job, preferably a rewarding, well-paying job.

However, Oregon must avoid making many decisions that led to California's current situation. The costs of California disease are more than those reflected in the economic statistics. Devastated communities and families, and wasted opportunities, could infect this fair state for years to come.

Read the whole things here....

Another Giant Falls

2009 will be the year that so many giants in their respective fields passed.

Think about it

Michael Jackson
Ed McMahon
Billy Mays
Walter Cronkite
Les Paul
Eunice Kennedy
Farrah Fawcett
Paul Harvey

Each in their own way was a giant in their field. And now The Prince of Darkness, Bob Novak goes down.

May he rest in peace.

Because "progressives" are calm rational types

Check out this picture of John Yoo.

Do you think this babe is telling Mr. Yoo how much she loves him?

Read the account here at NRO.

Where's the anti war crowd?

Byron York on the mysterious disappearance of the anti war crowd once Obama took office.....

Remember the anti-war movement? Not too long ago, the Democratic party's most loyal voters passionately opposed the war in Iraq. Democratic presidential candidates argued over who would withdraw American troops the quickest. Netroots activists regularly denounced President George W. Bush, and sometimes the U.S. military ("General Betray Us"). Cindy Sheehan, the woman whose soldier son was killed in Iraq, became a heroine when she led protests at Bush's Texas ranch.

That was then. Now, even though the United States still has roughly 130,000 troops in Iraq, and is quickly escalating the war in Afghanistan -- 68,000 troops there by the end of this year, and possibly more in 2010 -- anti-war voices on the Left have fallen silent.

Maybe Obama sent them to Gitmo.........

More...

Put the AP on the fishy list

Someone needs to put the AP on the fishy list since they're reporting that Obama is going back on a campaign pledge.

Since the AP is a pain in the ass read it here.......

Huh?

So we can't allow US oil companies to drill off shore in this country but our Treasury has plenty of money to finance off shore drilling in Brazil?

You read that headline correctly. Unfortunately, the Obama Administration is financing oil exploration off Brazil.

The U.S. is going to lend billions of dollars to Brazil's state-owned oil company, Petrobras, to finance exploration of the huge offshore discovery in Brazil's Tupi oil field in the Santos Basin near Rio de Janeiro. Brazil's planning minister confirmed that White House National Security Adviser James Jones met this month with Brazilian officials to talk about the loan.

The U.S. Export-Import Bank tells us it has issued a "preliminary commitment" letter to Petrobras in the amount of $2 billion and has discussed with Brazil the possibility of increasing that amount. Ex-Im Bank says it has not decided whether the money will come in the form of a direct loan or loan guarantees. Either way, this corporate foreign aid may strike some readers as odd, given that the U.S. Treasury seems desperate for cash and Petrobras is one of the largest corporations in the Americas.

But look on the bright side. If President Obama has embraced offshore drilling in Brazil, why not in the old U.S.A.? The land of the sorta free and the home of the heavily indebted has enormous offshore oil deposits, and last year ahead of the November elections, with gasoline at $4 a gallon, Congress let a ban on offshore drilling expire.

More.........

The difference between health care and health coverage

I've pointed out before that there is a big difference between health care and health coverage. Just because you have coverage doesn't mean that actually get care. Just ask a Canadian.

Here's a piece that emphasizes this...

It's not a perfect system. There appear to be 3 tiers of coverage available to Americans today. Superb, for those who can afford treatment at any cost. Average to sub-optimal coverage for the vast majority of working class Americans, and poor-to-none for the uninsured. Yet, this should not be confused with access to health care.

Most people who walk into an ER are provided some level of health care, whether or not they can pay for services. In fact, a requirement of not-for-profit hospitals in order to maintain their favorable tax status, is that they must treat a number of patients for free, or at least far below their cost.

My neighbor, who posts a large sign in a front window that erroneously demands "Health Care Now" doesn't appreciate the significant difference between health care and health coverage -- like so many Americans currently caught up in the emotional fray. In fact, the health care providers currently provide access for everyone. It's not access that is in question.

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Seniors get it

CBS News has learned that up to 60,000 people have cancelled their AARP memberships since July 1, angered over the group's position on health care.

Elaine Guardiani has been with AARP for 14 years, and said, "I'm extremely disappointed in AARP."

Retired nurse Dale Anderson has 12 years with AARP and said, "I don't wanna be connected with AARP."

Many are switching to the American Seniors Association, a group that calls itself the conservative alternative as CBS News Investigative Correspondent Sharyl Attkisson reports.

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Rep. Massa Addresses Netroots: I will vote against the interests of my district

Why I'm a conservative #661

Because governmental entities just cannot help themselves but to pack on waste like Joey Chestnut swallowing hot dogs............

This decade has been good for associate vice chancellors at UNC-Chapel Hill. Their numbers have nearly doubled, from 10 to 19, and the money paid to them has more than tripled, to a total of nearly $4 million a year.

The university now admits that some of these people were in jobs that were not vital. They represent the rapid management growth in the 16-campus UNC system that has added tens of millions of dollars to annual payrolls.

Now, with a tough economy and sinking tax revenues, UNC officials and state lawmakers say these jobs need cutting first.

A News & Observer analysis of university payroll data and similar work done by the UNC General Administration shows that many of the 16 campuses have expanded their bureaucracies at a big expense. Administrators are among the best paid people on the campuses, typically earning $100,000 or more.

Systemwide over the past five years, the administrative ranks have grown by 28 percent, from 1,269 administrative jobs to 1,623 last year, UNC-system data show. That's faster than the growth of faculty and other teaching positions -- 24 percent -- and faster than student enrollment at 14 percent.

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O-Harmony.com

The White House for the first time Sunday seemed to acknowledge that people across the country received unsolicited e-mails from the administration last week about health care reform, suggesting the problem is with third-party groups that placed the recipients' names on the distribution list.

In a written statement released exclusively to FOX News, White House spokesman Nick Shapiro said the White House hopes those who received the e-mails without signing up for them were not "inconvenienced" by the messages.

"The White House e-mail list is made up of e-mail addresses obtained solely through the White House Web site. The White House doesn't purchase, upload or merge from any other list, again, all e-mails come from the White House Web site as we have no interest in e-mailing anyone who does not want to receive an e-mail," the statement said. "If an individual received the e-mail because someone else or a group signed them up or forwarded the e-mail, we hope they were not too inconvenienced."

The White House previously would not answer questions on how the e-mails landed unsolicited in so many inboxes. White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs on Thursday said he couldn't give an answer until he saw who received the e-mails because he doesn't have "omnipotent clarity."

Yet the White House ignored repeated offers from FOX News to share with the administration such e-mail addresses, to help determine how the recipients ended up on the White House distribution list.

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We want these guys to run health care?

Cash for Clunkers. You'd think these would be a slam dunk for a government bureaucracy to manage. Negative.......

A growing number of auto dealers say the process of getting paid under the government's "cash for clunkers" plan increasingly resembles some of the wrecks accumulating on their lots as part of the program.

The slow payments coming from the federal government are reinforcing the paradoxical nature of the program for dealers: It has generated the most showroom traffic they have had in months while at the same time heaping unease, frustration and worry onto the industry's worst-ever downturn.

As of the close of business Friday, there was talk in the industry that some dealers are considering pulling out of the clunkers program altogether.

"A number of dealers have floated $100,000 to upwards of $1 million or more" on the clunkers program, said Bill Sepic, president of the Wisconsin Automobile & Truck Dealers Association.

Dealers say they want to see at least some sign that they will be able to recoup that money. Still others need the money to pay bills and meet payroll.

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The clue phone is ringing

The conventional wisdom in politics is that when your opponent is attempting suicide, get out of the way.

Republicans seem content to let the Obamunists implode, but their day of reckoning will come soon enough.....

Republican candidates must recognize the Obama disaster as a unique opportunity to explain the fundamental flaws in the statist model our nation has pursued for generations. Obama was not a transformational figure. He merely jumped liberalism ahead by a few election cycles, and demonstrated the final, fatal absurdity of its philosophy. Republicans should take this unique opportunity to attack the horrendously mistaken, supposedly invulnerable assumptions which have guided the devolution of our federal government since the New Deal. Obama was the inevitable product of machinery that has been groaning and clanking in the American basement for decades. We don’t want Republicans to tell us how they could deliver the nanny state for a bit less money than Obama wanted to spend. We don’t want to hear the 2008 Democrats portrayed as well-meaning reformers who just over-reached a little bit, or handled the marketing effort for their programs badly. We need leaders with the courage to head down into the basement with sledgehammers, and start knocking Roosevelt and Johnson’s nightmare machine to pieces. It’s not enough to just roll the current madness back a little, then let the whole tragedy play itself out again, with our children as the captive audience.

Every politician runs on a platform of “change.” We want change in 2010… but, for once, we want the government to change. We’ve had enough of people like Obama trying to use the government to change us. We’re tired of being slammed with thousand-page bills that tell us what we have to sacrifice, and what we’re not allowed to do. We want to see some one-page bills that list things the government is not allowed to do.

We reject the assumption that virtue is the exclusive province of the State. We’ve had enough of being told we’re morally obligated to hand over our fortunes to thieves who squander it on fleets of luxury jet aircraft and endless foreign junkets. We see nothing moral about giving the State a dollar, so it can give a nickel to someone it finds deserving of our compulsory charity. We see the State as a necessary expense to secure our safety, and like all expenses, it should be kept to a prudent minimum.

Read the whole thing...........

Don't you know who I am?

Maybe Dr. Gates can take a lesson in humiliation after this story........

For example, 68-year old Bob Dylan, in rolling stone fashion, was innocently walking alone in a Long Branch, New Jersey, neighborhood recently. A 20-something police officer thought this was odd, and pulled over to question the suspect. No ID. Support was called in. Neither of the two officers recognized the American icon. Indeed, they apparently had never even heard of Bob Dylan — and so put him in the first squad car to take him back to his hotel to verify whether he was really an entertainer of some sort.

When his story checked out, the officers released him and left. A city official said of Dylan, "He couldn't have been any nicer to them." Apparently there were no Dylan rants about whom the police were "messin'" with, no reference to their mothers, no mayoral or gubernatorial editorial, no presidential sermon on police acting stupidly by profiling and putting a man in a police car for simply walking the street.

Trust me. If these cops lived with the Lovely Mrs. Gekko they'd know who Robert Zimmerman is.

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College Student Challenges Obama To Debate On Health Care At Colorado Town Hall

Obama the Joker Disses the US Postal Service to Promote Government Controlled Health Care.