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David Warren with a summit update.
Perhaps I was too optimistic in my Wednesday column, which gave reasons to hope the London G20 Summit would null out entirely — and thus, no additional damage would be done to the world economy.
I tend to underestimate the power of fantasia. When 20-plus of the planet’s most excruciating egos are gathered in one place, under a general expectation they will accomplish something, an upbeat communiqué is likely to emerge.
In the event, our great leaders were able to conjure another trillion or so (in dollars: Euros would be more expensive) to shovel into the black holes. And they found a common cause, at least in badmouthing the world’s few remaining tax havens. …
The left-wing Manchester Guardian has some fun with BO, the great orator.
John Fund details a significant loss for cap and trade fans.
Last week Claudia Rosett wrote on the U. S. application for membership in the UN human rights group. Today, it’s Ann Bayefsky’s turn.
Pres. Barack Obama has announced that the United States will seek a seat on the U.N. Human Rights Council for the first time. The formal election of new members is in May, but the result is a foregone conclusion. The human-rights abusers who dominate the Council and use it to protect themselves, to eliminate universal standards, and to demonize their democratic foes are already celebrating.
This is a surrender of American values unlike any other. The spectacle of this particular president legitimizing a lethal weapon for the defeat of human rights will haunt him until the end of his term.
The Council was created in March 2006 after the U.N. Human Rights Commission became too much of an embarrassment even for the U.N. The General Assembly rejected a U.S. proposal requiring that states actually protect human rights as a condition of Council membership. As a result, the United States voted against the Assembly resolution that gave it birth.
The Bush administration also refused to use taxpayer dollars to pay for the Council. Obama’s move will reverse this policy. It is, therefore, important to appreciate exactly what American tax dollars will now be purchasing. Here is a sample of what the Council has “accomplished” over its short history. …
You’ll love reading how counties in the NY-20 congressional district made it difficult for the military to vote. Story from the Corner.
Charles Krauthammer on the president’s agenda.
… Obama has far different ambitions. His goal is to rewrite the American social compact, to recast the relationship between government and citizen. He wants government to narrow the nation’s income and anxiety gaps. Soak the rich for reasons of revenue and justice. Nationalize health care and federalize education to grant all citizens of all classes the freedom from anxiety about health care and college that the rich enjoy. And fund this vast new social safety net through the cash cow of a disguised carbon tax.
Obama is a leveler. He has come to narrow the divide between rich and poor. For him the ultimate social value is fairness. Imposing it upon the American social order is his mission.
Fairness through leveling is the essence of Obamaism. (Asked by Charlie Gibson during a campaign debate about his support for raising capital gains taxes — even if they caused a net revenue loss to the government — Obama stuck to the tax hike “for purposes of fairness.”) The elements are highly progressive taxation, federalized health care and higher education, and revenue-producing energy controls. But first he must deal with the sideshows. They could sink the economy and poison his public support before he gets to enact his real agenda. …
Matthew Continetti doesn’t think much of BO’s budget or the GOP alternative.
You can learn a lot from a budget. President Obama’s $3.6 trillion behemoth isn’t just a bunch of numbers and tables. It’s a vision of where America ought to be in the future. Obama would ramp up government spending in health care, energy, and education. Taxpayers would foot the bill for a larger, more intrusive government that would claim to improve the quality of life and reduce inequality.
Annual deficits and a growing public debt burden would be secondary to improving society. Obama is betting that, by throwing money at schools and hospitals and environmentally friendly industries, he’ll lay the foundation for the next economic boom. The president says he’s neither a socialist nor a big-government liberal. He sees himself as the venture-capitalist-in-chief.
The problem with all this is that Obama has an oversized confidence in what government can achieve. The economy and society aren’t toys that the president and his whiz-kid policymakers can manipulate to achieve their desired ends. The economy and society are complex organisms that constantly mutate. They repel, adapt to, or coopt outside pressures. They frustrate attempts at rational control. …
… When Obama says his budget heralds “a new era of responsibility,” he’s not talking about individual responsibility, or the responsibility of families to raise the next generation. Nor does he mean government’s responsibility to provide for a decent measure of social and national security, and a legal and regulatory framework that allows civil society and the free market to flourish. No, Obama is talking about the responsibilities government is going to impose on us in the form of higher taxes. The upshot is more government, and still more debt. Not to mention a dependent citizenry.
We wish we could say that Republicans had stepped up to the plate with a compelling, competing vision of America’s future. Unfortunately, that hasn’t happened yet. As visions go, the alternative budget that the House GOP offered last week is pretty dim. …
Kimberley Strassel outlines how BO’s machine attacks the ones it fears the most.
The thing about fear is that you can see it. For an insight as to what the left today fears most, witness its attempted political assassination of Eric Cantor.
The 45-year-old Virginia congressman came to Washington in 2001, and by last year had been unanimously elected Republican Whip, under Minority Leader John Boehner. In recent months, Mr. Cantor has helped unify the GOP against much of President Barack Obama’s agenda, in particular his blowout $787 billion stimulus, and yesterday, his blowout $3.6 trillion budget.
He’s also one of the GOP’s up-and-coming talents. Along with Wisconsin’s Paul Ryan, or California’s Kevin McCarthy, he represents a new guard, one that’s sworn off earmarks and brought the conversation back to fiscal responsibility and economic opportunity. They’ve focused on party outreach, and are popular with younger voters and independents. They are big fund-raisers, part of a drive to recruit and elect more reformers. And they are on the rise.
All of which threatens the left. Democrats know their current dominance in Washington is in no small part due to public disillusionment with the GOP. They are also aware that their current tax-and-spend governance is creating plenty of opportunities for that opposition to remake itself. Thus the furious campaign — waged by every blog, pundit, union, 527, and even the White House — to kneecap Republicans who might help lead a makeover. Mr. Cantor is the top target. …
Couple of Corner posts on the mark to market accounting rule changes that did so much to improve the markets.
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