The Bailout Is Unconstitutional

George F. Will - Bailing Out of the Constitution - washingtonpost.com:

"It is high time Americans heard an argument that might turn a vague national uneasiness into a vivid awareness of something going very wrong. The argument is that the Emergency Economic Stabilization Act of 2008 (EESA) is unconstitutional."

George Will makes the argument that Congress cannot delegate its constitutionally reserved powers to the executive branch, and that is what it has done in the TARP bailout law. That's right, I almost forgot about it, we have that Constitution thingy.

Uh - oh: The Putsch Continues

Sebelius Open to Fast-Track Process for Health Bill - WSJ.com:

"WASHINGTON -- Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, President Barack Obama's nominee for secretary of Health and Human Services, indicated Tuesday she wouldn't take off the table a fast-track process for passing a health-overhaul bill despite Republicans' opposition to the tactic. Ms. Sebelius, testifying before the Senate Health, Education, Labor and Pensions Committee, said she had spoken with members of Congress who support using the budget-reconciliation process to pass health legislation, which would allow a bill to pass in the Senate with only 51 votes rather than 60."

Yet another fundamental change to a massive portion of our economic system may be shoved down our throat without even any respect for the Senate rules. 1 senator will be able to decide the future of our health care system and 17% of our economy. Glad we elected this post-partisan, bi-partisan, centrist President.

FALSE CHOICE ALERT - Obama's verbal tick

Mark Steyn: Government's grasp goes global | government, global, geithner, obama, economy - Opinion - OCRegister.com: "

In their first two months, Obama and Geithner have done nothing but vaporize your wealth, and your children's future. What began as an economic crisis is now principally a political usurpation. And, to return to the president's 'false choice,' that 'chaotic and unforgiving capitalism' is exactly what we need right now. It's the quickest, cheapest, fairest, most efficient route to economic stabilization and renewal. A regimented and eternally forgiving global command economy with no moral hazard will destroy us all."

I linked to this Mark Steyn paragraph because it so succinctly states what is going on. But it also gives us the opportunity to call a FALSE CHOICE alert. Whenever you hear FALSE CHOICE in an Obama speech you know you are being served up a STRAW MAN.

Obama - No Surprise Except To the Squishy Centrists and RINOs That Supported Him

Commentary » Blog Archive » Not Like We Didn’t See this Coming:

"Yes, there is an element of managerial incompetence, but the real issue is that the Right was correct about Obama: he’s an ultra-liberal at least on domestic policy, not a pragmatic centrist either on policy or in style. His mode of governance — denigrate the opposition, engage in ad hominem attacks, refuse to compromise on substantive policy, disguise radical policy intentions with a haze of meaningless rhetoric — bespeaks someone supremely confident in his ideological views and undaunted by fears (which are slowly creeping up on his Red state colleagues) of having overshot his mandate."

President Obama's performance to date, rather than being a disappointment or surprise, has been one of the most predictable outcomes I have observed since I began following politics some decades ago. We need to find clever ways to unmask his tactics (e.g. STRAW MAN ALERT) and apply them with great vigor. I can barely imagine how ineffectual this President may become if stripped of his power to mesmerize and obfuscate. Hat tip to Mark Steyn for pointing me in the direction of this Commentary blog.

Leftie Indoctrination - Paid for by Mr and Mrs Middle America

Big Hollywood » Blog Archive » PBS’ Dickens Adaptation Politicizes, Vulgarizes Classic Novel:

"The latest PBS adaptation of Charles Dickens’s classic novel Oliver Twist demonstrates the urgent need for reform of the taxpayer-supported broadcasting service–or an end to taxpayer funding for it."

PBS can't seem to touch anything without turning into a thinly veiled lecture in leftist politics and philosophy. It would be easy to say, "just don't watch PBS." However, these remakes of classic english literature will certainly be adopted by classroom teachers all across American, making even the teaching of the canon an opportunity for leftist indoctrination. I am convinced that we have reached the point we are at politically because we have been saddled by our public education system and our universities with an unthinking and indoctrinated electorate. Until we figure out how to break the left's stranglehold on education, we face an uphill battle.

Hubris

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- Meet The New Boss:

"President Obama said Monday, 'my team will be working closely with GM to produce a better business plan.'

To that confident assertion he added these stern sentiments:

'They must ask themselves: Have they consolidated enough unprofitable brands? Have they cleaned up their balance sheets, or are they still saddled with so much debt that they can't make future investments? Above all, have they created a credible model for how not only to survive, but to succeed in this competitive global market?'"

It's frightening to contemplate the fact that the President can make a statement like this with a straight face. The work audacity was not in one of his book titles for naught. What does the President's team know about running an auto company? It's too bad Barack Obama couldn't have taken a few days off the campaign trail two years ago to visit the executives in Detroit and set them straight. If he had confronted them with these inciteful questions two years ago, perhaps they could have course-corrected and spared themselves this whole crisis.

The best thing "his team" could do is get out of the way and let these companies reorganize under the bankruptcy laws. It is clear that the unions aren't willing to do what is necessary to save these companies. And the bondholders, who who know the proposed reforms are half measures, aren't willing to be paid off in equity. We are just throwing more good taxpayer money after bad. We'll be bailing them out again in a couple of months. The FIAT merger is just a way to kick the can down the road for a while. The last thing an ailing car company needs is to merge with another ailing car company. Too bad the anti-special interests President is too beholden to organized labor to act in the best interest of all the American people.

Dangerous Naivete in Foreign Policy

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- Rookie Errors Mar Obama's Efforts So Far:

"What did his televised overture to the Iranians accomplish, except to reassure them that he was not going to do a damn thing to stop them from getting a nuclear bomb? It is a mistake that can go ringing down the corridors of history.

Future generations who live in the shadow of that nuclear threat may wonder what we were thinking about, putting our lives — and theirs — in the hands of a rookie because we liked his style and symbolism?"

This column does a great job of covering the broad range of foolish foreign policy actions this administration has undertaken in its two months on the job. I believe the President's letter to the Russians, and his video to the Iranians were highly personal initiatives - and they both show how terribly wrong-headed he is in dealing with dangerous foreign adversaries.

Some Fun

After that last posting, I thought I'd better serve up some fun. Check out this YouTube Video: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xksO2E4eNGY

Obama's Unilateralist Afghan Policy

The World from Berlin: Success or Failure in Afghanistan Will Depend on Americans - SPIEGEL ONLINE - News - International:

"'If Obama had any illusions whatsoever when he took office about whether his partners would abandon their increasing reserve on the issue of Afghanistan, then those have been buried by now. Of course, the emissaries he sent to the region and to his partners have told him that by now. Germany may be willing to keep its current 3,400 troops in the country, but other countries are firmly holding to their plans to withdraw. Holland will pull out 1,700 troops by
2010, and a year later Canada's 2,800-soldier contingent will return home. The success or failure on the main front in the battle against radical Islam will be determined by the US's engagement there.'"

I thought if we stopped calling them "Old Europe" and made nice to them, our "allies" were supposed to be more supportive of our foreign policy. Wasn't Afghanistan the war we all agreed upon?

Of course, no amount of diplomacy, cajoling, cow-towing, or conferring with the Europeans can elicit any significant contribution from them. They lack the backbone and the resources to be of any help. They long ago gave up on funding a meaningful defense. Their money has been all sucked up by their welfare state economies. And their resolve has been sapped by the nihilism that permeates their cultures.

At current course and speed, that'll be us in another 10 years.

Pay No Attention to All Those Red Lines - After All I Inherited a Deficit

Projected Deficit - washingtonpost.com
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/graphic/2009/03/21/GR2009032100104.html

At his press conference, the President repeatedly evaded answering questions about whether he was sticking our children with paying for our overspending. As I recall, his arguments were:

1) I inherited a big deficit. How that justifies going on to triple the deficit you inherited totally escapes me.

2) It's either do what I propose or do nothing. STRAW MAN ALERT. There really is no course of action somewhere between doing nothing and running up $9.3 TRILLION in deficits?

3) If we don't spend all this money on education and healthcare, there's no way our economy is going to grow at even 2% HUH? Which economy has been the growth engine of the world, the US, or the European socialist states Pres Obama wants to turn us into? And how does throwing more money at our woefully inefficient education system, without reforming it, promise to generate any return on our "investment?" Thus far, federal spending on education has been pretty much inversely related to the global competitiveness of our education system.

The BIggest Threat To Freedom and Prosperity

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- Copenhagen: Environmental Munich:

"Writing in the Financial Times recently, Czech President Vaclav Klaus said: 'As someone who lived under communism for most of his life, I feel obliged to say that I see the biggest threat to freedom, democracy, the market economy and prosperity now is ambitious environmentalism, not communism.' Klaus told the Cato Institute recently that 'environmentalism is a religion' that accepts global warming on faith and seeks to exploit it to reshape the world and economic social order."

Read this piece on the UN meetings taking place in Copenhagen. The accord they hope to pass represents a suicide pact for western economies. The anti-capitalists have repeatedly failed to gain public support in the US. Environmentalism is their back-door way of accomplishing their agenda.

Down With the Dollar

A world currency moves nearer after Tim Geithner's slip - Telegraph:

"US Treasury Secretary Tim Geithner confessed on Wednesday that he had not read the plans by China's central bank governor for a 'super-sovereign reserve currency' run by the International Monetary Fund, but nevertheless let slip that Washington was 'open' to the idea. Whoops."

This is how matters quickly escalate in geo-finance. China's suggestion – backed by Russia, Brazil, and India, and clearly aimed at breaking US dollar hegemony – is making its way onto the agenda of the G20 Summit next week. 'Dollar-dämmerung' no longer looks so far-fetched.

Maybe Geithner is angling to get that new job running the World Treasury at the United Nations.

Obama Administration Pursuing Unilateralist Economic Policy

Gordon Brown retreats on Budget spending spree - Telegraph:

"Gordon Brown seemed to heed warnings about the health of the Britain's public finances as he retreated from plans for a massive spending package to revive the economy in next month's Budget."

Pres. Obama's only major ally in the push for continued massive stimulus has thrown in the towel, apparently convinced that there is actually such a thing as spending too much money you don't have. When will this Cowboy administration get in step with our European allies and stop trying to go it alone?

Europeans to America - You're Spending Like Drunken Europeans

EU presidency: US and UK economic recovery plans are 'a way to hell' - Telegraph:

"Mr Topolanek warned the European Parliament that the Obama administration's stimulus package and financial bail-out 'will undermine the stability of the global financial market'.

”All of these steps, these combinations and permanency is the way to hell,” he told Euro-MPs in Strasbourg

”We need to read the history books and the lessons of history and the biggest success of the EU is the refusal to go this way.”"

I think the Europeans are getting really freaked. For decades its been the hard-charging capitalist economy of the US that has been the growth engine of the world. Who's going to take over that role if Pres Obama turns us into a pseudo-european social democratic welfare state?

Tell Your Congressman - While You Are Passing Bills of Attainder...

Rahm Emanuel's profitable stint at mortgage giant -- chicagotribune.com:

"Before its portfolio of bad loans helped trigger the current housing crisis, mortgage giant Freddie Mac was the focus of a major accounting scandal that led to a management shake-up, huge fines and scalding condemnation of passive directors by a top federal regulator.

One of those allegedly asleep-at-the-switch board members was Chicago's Rahm Emanuel—now chief of staff to President Barack Obama—who made at least $320,000 for a 14-month stint at Freddie Mac that required little effort."...

John Coffee, a law professor and expert on corporate governance at Columbia University, said the financial crisis at Freddie Mac was years in the making and fueled by chronically weak oversight by the firm's directors. The presence of presidential appointees on the board didn't help, he added.

...Please get back our $320,000 you paid Rahm Emanuel for doing nothing while Freddie Mac helped kick off this whole financial meltdown. Where's the outrage???

If Only We Had Had Government Bureaucrats Running the Financial System

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- Control Freaks:

"with all these plans to exert ever more control over the economy, few people are asking the appropriate question: Do those in government have the knowledge and ability to run our economy?

The answer, put bluntly, is no. This could be seen in Postmaster General John Potter's trip to Congress Wednesday, begging for more money for the ailing postal service. 'We are facing losses of historic proportion,' he said. 'Our situation is critical.'

This from the head of a government-run company that has a virtual monopoly in its business — the delivery of first-class mail — and still can't make a profit. Losses last year totaled $2.8 billion.

Two other major government enterprises — Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac — were largely responsible for the mess we're in now. Managed mostly by former Democratic politicians, they too had a virtual monopoly, holding $5.4 trillion of the total $12 trillion in U.S. mortgages, and still went bust."

Don't Distract Us With the Facts - We Have a Healthcare System to Destroy!

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- How U.S. Health Care Really Stacks Up:

"'People in countries with more government control of health care are highly dissatisfied and believe reform is needed.' More than seven in 10 Germans, Canadians, Australians, New Zealanders and Britons say their health systems need either 'fundamental change' or 'complete rebuilding.'"

A must read, this article gives lie to the leftist claims that America's health system is inferior and in need of nationalization.

We Knew It All Along

IBDeditorials.com: Editorials, Political Cartoons, and Polls from Investor's Business Daily -- Yes, Hugo Cheated:

"Anyone who steals an election has no claim to democracy. But somehow there's an exception for Venezuela's President Hugo Chavez, who's still recognized as a 'democratically elected' leader by the U.S. and others.

It now comes to light that the CIA cybersecurity experts know he fixed his 2004 recall referendum. Two weeks ago, at a field hearing before the U.S. Election Assistance Commission in Orlando, Fla., CIA's Steve Stigall cited Venezuela, along with Macedonia and Ukraine, as examples of the risks of electronic voting.

Chavez, he said, controlled most voting machines and may have provided the program used to 'randomly' select them for audit during a recount, the Miami Herald reported.

The problem went beyond cheating. The referendum was then certified as free and fair by none other than ex-President Jimmy Carter and recognized by the hemisphere as democratic."

It was well known at the time that Chavez rigged the 2004 recall. That's what made it so shocking that tyrant-lover Jimmy Carter lent credibility to the result. Two lessons from this story:

1) Jimmy Carter never met an American-hating tyrant he didn't like
2) Electronic voting machines only make election rigging easier - give me an audit trail of paper ballots any day

Would Someone Put a Muzzle on This Guy?

Geithner Says Dollar to Remain World’s Dominant Reserve Currency - NYTimes.com:

"Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner on Wednesday said
that the dollar would remain the world’s dominant reserve currency for some time
to come, clarifying earlier remarks that sent the dollar tumbling."

Geithner needs to take a teleprompter with him wherever he goes.

Pravda Act of 2009

U.S. bill seeks to rescue faltering newspapers Politics Reuters:

"WASHINGTON (Reuters) - With many U.S. newspapers struggling
to survive, a Democratic senator on Tuesday introduced a bill to help them by
allowing newspaper companies to restructure as nonprofits with a variety of tax
breaks."

This is a horrible idea, but, on reflection, I can't imagine that the quality of reportage could sink any lower than it already has. At least if they are vassals of the state, we could dictate what kind of curtains they have in their offices and how big a bonus they can pay down at the local newspaper.