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George W. Bush’s signature achievement was his perseverance in Iraq. It made possible the uprising in Iran. Guess what Walter “White Flag” Cronkite’s advice was. That’s right. The man who wanted to bug out of Vietnam wished for the same in Iraq. Media Research Center has the story.
David Warren looks at the political tactics behind some of the current topics of the day.
…it is now crystal clear that President Obama’s campaign assurances of moderation were obfuscatory. He is transforming U.S. policies, from established centrist to extreme left, right across the board, through about two dozen radical “policy czars” commanding bureaucratic agencies beyond the practical diurnal reach of a Congress that his party anyway controls.
This is a clever revolutionary tactic, because when any of these czars makes a policy decision that blows up politically, Obama himself can play the “moderate” again, negotiating a middle way between the czar in question, and any potentially Democrat constituency that might be offended. Meanwhile his public relations team tells us, “Don’t call them czars!” and the mainstream media dutifully oblige.
It would take a book, not a column, merely to survey the current horrors. One little example: Patrick Leahy and Harry Reid have embedded Canadian-style “anti-hate” or “thought crimes” legislation in the current U.S. defence appropriation bill, so that senators who don’t want it must also vote to cut off funding to the troops. Count on this legislation being used to stifle their political adversaries, in America at large; just as “human rights” codes are used up here to chill the opponents of the Left’s various social engineering schemes.
From Trudeau’s Omnibus Bill of 1969, forward, I have found, consistently, all my adult life, that this is how the Left operates: in the slimiest and most deceitful available way, in order to short-out public discussion and manufacture the fait accompli. …
David Harsanyi notes that “sticking it to the rich” hurts the economy.
In the United States, the top 20 percent of earners pay 70 percent of all federal taxes. For many, there is no risk in supporting pricey utopian experiments in Washington. “The other half” pays. Certainly, this brand of governance offers little in the way of the celebrated “sacrifice” the president keeps going on about.
Republicans were a major reason for this untenably skewed equation, as they cut taxes as reliably as they increased spending. Democrats, now on a hyper-spending binge for the ages, won’t raise taxes on the vast majority of Americans, either.
As eternal tools of Satan, we understand that the wealthy normally attain their largesse via human misery, corporate plundering and the raping of the environment, but they also tend to be smart. They tend to calculate their taxes and make up any losses by investing less, opening fewer businesses, hiring fewer people and spending less money.
The National Federation of Independent Business claims that the congressional health care plan could cost 1.6 million jobs — most of them in small businesses — and decrease wages across the board.
John Fund posts on an interesting twist in the Obamacare debate. Senator Tom Coburn introduced an amendment that members of Congress must enroll in the federal healthcare program.
..his reading of the 1,000-page health care bill convinced him that everyone would end up being forced into the public plan as private insurance carriers were squeezed out of the market by mandates and regulations. Therefore, if Congress decides a government-run health plan is good enough for the American people, it should be willing to put itself under its care umbrella.
By a 12 to 11 margin, the Senate Health Committee agreed. Senator Kennedy was absent but Chris Dodd, as acting chairman, cast a proxy vote in favor of the Coburn amendment. Maryland Senator Barbara Mikulski was the only other Democrat to back the measure. Every Republican save for New Hampshire’s Judd Gregg voted in favor of the Coburn mandate.
Obviously, many members of Congress — who are used to a generous and flexible set of health benefits — have no intention of letting the Coburn mandate become law. …
Fund also posts on the intelligent move Obama made in appointing Hillary to State.
…Ms. Clinton … has kept a low profile not entirely of her own choosing. “Left behind on major presidential trips, overruled in choosing her own staff — Hillary Clinton is the invisible woman at State. But Obama’s brilliant foreign-policy spouse may not stay silent forever,” writes Hillary watcher Tina Brown in her “Daily Beast” column.
Adds Ms. Brown: “It becomes clearer by the day how cleverly Obama checkmated both Clintons by putting Hillary in the topmost Cabinet job.”
Indeed, Mrs. Clinton has been increasingly frustrated by a White House that appears to want to smother all cabinet departments with its central control. The State Department was caught by surprise this month when the Obama administration announced it was sending an ambassador to Syria. Foreign Policy magazine notes that “there may not be much time to convince world leaders she is the person to deal with rather than super envoys like Richard Holbrooke, George Mitchell.” The magazine cites “a foreign-policy hand in former president Bill Clinton’s administration” as saying that Mrs. Clinton has to assert her authority and “take on some of the key issues that had been tasked to special envoys.”
The Obama administration has become thick with czars and special foreign policy envoys. Richard Holbrooke oversees Afghan and Pakistani policy. Former Senate Majority Leader George Mitchell handles the Middle East, and there are other envoys tasked with North Korea, Sudan and climate change. That often doesn’t leave much room for the Secretary of State. …
Fund’s last post concerns the amazing leniency Obama’s Justice Department displayed in prosecuting members of the New Black Panther Party that intimidated voters in the last election. Voter intimidation? Given a punt? Are talking we about the United States of America?
The charges against the Black Panthers were serious. They were accused in a civil complaint by the Bush Justice Department of coercion, threats, intimidation, and hurling racial slurs while at a Philadelphia polling station on Election Day last year. Prosecutors say one of the men brandished a nightstick and pointed it at voters near the polling-place door.
Bartle Bull, a civil rights lawyer and former New York state campaign manager for Robert F. Kennedy’s 1968 presidential campaign, said in an affidavit that the behavior he witnessed in Philadelphia was “the most blatant form of voter intimidation. They were positioned in a location that forced every voter to pass in close proximity to them. The weapon was openly displayed and brandished in plain sight of voters.” …
… This is eye-popping stuff. As Mr. Bull notes, the original Bush civil complaint had aimed at enjoining all 28 of the New Black Panther Party’s chapters around the country from certain political activities. Why did the Obama Justice Department punt?
John Stossel comments on GM.
…Business, to survive, must be a supplicant: it must work hard to please its customers, constantly adapt to meet their changing tastes, beg them to even visit the showroom to consider a purchase. Business is good. There are a few cheaters—I made a career reporting on them—but they are exceptions. Overwhelmingly, business serves us very well…
In case readers are wondering if Pickings will point out slimy tactics on the right. Read about the American Conservative Union as it tries to shake down Fed-Ex. Volokh Conspiracy has the story.
Fed-Ex and UPS are embroiled in a nasty political fight. In short, UPS is seeking legislative changes that will increase FedEx’s regulatory and labor costs. Specifically, UPS wants to force FedEx to be covered by the National Labor Relations Act, as UPS is, rather than the Railway Labor Act. FedEx is currently under the latter because it primarily relies upon air shipping. UPS is primarily a ground carrier, so it falls under the NLRA. Unions also support the shift, as it would likely increase unionization within FedEx.
Many conservatives have been critical of UPS’ campaign (see here and here). At least one conservative group, the American Conservative Union, also appears to have sought support for a campaign in support of FedEx, only to shift sides when its request was turned down. According to The Politico, ACU sent met with FedEx officials and sent them a letter seeking over $2 million to fund a “grassroots” campaign against the so-called “Brown Bailout.” “We have reviewed your concerns regarding the NLRB and we believe we could strongly support your position,” the letter said.
Apparently FedEx wasn’t buying. So the ACU just turned its energies to other important issues, right? Within weeks of seeking money from FedEx for the anti-UPS effort, ACU Chairman David Keene joined other conservative activists signing a letter bearing the ACU logo that attacked FedEx for calling the pro-UPS policy proposal the “Brown Bailout.” Labeling what UPS seeks as a “bailout” is improper, the second letter said, because “UPS was not seeking any taxpayer funds — only regulatory reform that would insure equal treatment of both companies under our nation?s labor laws.” …
Jennifer Rubin comments on another instance of the politization of the Justice Department, from David Ignatius’ piece on the targeting of the CIA. Rubin also brings up the increasingly familiar theme of Obama using good cop-bad cop tactics to advance his political goals.
…David Ignatius, who already has expressed distaste for the political assault launched by the administration and Congress on the CIA, is beside himself after the latest shenanigans. He writes:
The latest “scandals” involving the Central Intelligence Agency are genuinely hard to understand, other than in terms of political payback. Attorney General Eric Holder is considering appointing a prosecutor to investigate criminal actions by CIA officers involved in the harsh interrogation of al-Qaeda prisoners. But the internal CIA report on which he’s said to be basing this decision was referred five years ago to the Justice Department, where attorneys concluded that no prosecution was warranted. …
…Ignatius sympathizes with the president who he says is trying (really, he is!) not to look back. He continues:
CIA veterans were skeptical about Obama’s promise, especially when the president said the next day that Holder would make the final decision. But lawyers who studied the case thought Holder would decide against a prosecutor because he almost certainly couldn’t get convictions. It would be impossible to prove “criminal intent” for CIA interrogators who operated within the framework of the Justice Department’s guidance. And as for “unauthorized practices” outside the guidelines — such as kicks, threats and other abuse — that were revealed in a 2004 report by the CIA’s inspector general, Justice Department attorneys had already concluded that these actions didn’t warrant criminal prosecution.
But then there is Eric Holder marching forward, preparing prosecution with no legal basis. So what’s a president to do? Well, that’s where Ignatius frankly cops out. The president has made some pretty speeches, but what is he doing to halt this travesty? He is either a bystander in his own administration, allowing Holder to run amok, or he is playing a deceitful game of good cop-bad cop, perfectly content to allow Holder to proceed and more than happy to satisfy his craven netroot base. Which is it? …
Peter Wehner comments on Rubin’s piece in regards to the demoralization of the CIA.
… It is strange to me that Barack Obama, the candidate of “change and hope,” has, during the last six months, done a mighty fine job of building a bridge to the Democratic past. It is as if he has decided to skip the 1990’s and aimed to recreate the 1970’s and 1980’s. It seems to me that Obama most represents — in economic policies and national security affairs, if not in style and bearing — Walter Mondale and Jimmy Carter. There are of course some exceptions; but there are more similarities than Democrats ought to be comfortable with. Why Obama seems intent on resurrecting the worst of modern liberalism — from government spending (and soon, higher taxes) at home to weakness abroad — is a mystery to me. …
Here is David Ignatius’ article.
As other countries watch the United States lacerate its intelligence service — for activities already investigated or never undertaken — perhaps they admire America’s commitment to democracy and the rule of law. More likely, I fear, they conclude that we are just plain nuts.
The latest “scandals” involving the Central Intelligence Agency are genuinely hard to understand, other than in terms of political payback. Attorney General Eric Holder is considering appointing a prosecutor to investigate criminal actions by CIA officers involved in the harsh interrogation of al-Qaeda prisoners. But the internal CIA report on which he’s said to be basing this decision was referred five years ago to the Justice Department, where attorneys concluded that no prosecution was warranted.
Meanwhile, Democrats in Congress are indignant that they were never briefed about a program to assassinate al-Qaeda operatives in friendly countries. Never mind that the program wasn’t implemented, or that the United States is routinely assassinating al-Qaeda operatives using unmanned drones. And never mind that Leon Panetta, the new CIA director — fearing a potential flap — briefed Congress about the program soon after he became aware of it. There was a flap anyway — with a new hemorrhage of secrets and a new shudder from America’s intelligence partners around the world. …
Steve Chapman writes on other disingenuous aspects of Obamacare.
Some statements are inherently unbelievable. Such as: “I am an official of the government of Nigeria, and I would like to deposit $60 million in your bank account.” Or: “I’m Barry Bonds, and I thought it was flaxseed oil.” And this new one: “I’m Barack Obama, and I favor more competition in health insurance.” That, however, is the claim behind his support of a government-run health insurance plan to give consumers one more choice. The president says a “public option” would improve the functioning of the market because it would “force the insurance companies to compete and keep them honest.”
He has indicated that while he is willing to discuss a variety of remedies as part of health insurance reform, this one is non-negotiable. House Democrats, not surprisingly, included the government plan in the bill they unveiled Tuesday.
It will come as a surprise to private health insurance providers that they have not had to compete up till now. …
James Lileks says that Biden’s “gaffes” often express more truth than the official statements of the Obama administration.
Newsbusters reminds us it’s 40 years since Ted Kennedy abandoned his date Mary Jo Kopechne.
And we have a picture of the car Teddy should have been driving. Hint; it floats.