Not too fast, but furious

David Brooks: Obama’s use of executive privilege politically ‘stupid,’ ‘a winner’ for the GOP 

" “I think politically it’s stupid, because it is one thing if you’re invoking executive privilege over some national security issue. This is a policy everybody admits was profoundly stupid. Why are you not saying, ‘OK, this was a stupid policy, let’s get it out there and let’s figure out how it came about.’”

"Later in the segment, Brooks said the GOP was wise to use this against the administration to score political points.

" “I think it is a winner for the Republicans,” "

Why not just leak the Fast and Furious documents?  "If Justice Department documents that Issa’s committee seeks from Attorney General Eric Holder had been the subject of a top-secret meeting in the White House Situation Room, their contents already would have been splashed across the media. Issa could read the A1 New York Times story and be done with it."
Rich Lowry

http://townhall.com/political-cartoons/2012/06/22/100410

Why Does Obama Bow?

Russ Vaughan at American Thinker  "But this guy, supposedly the most powerful man in the world, bows down? I'm of two minds here, the first being that he's suffering from AAIIS and is simply insecure and unsure of himself. That would seem to be borne out by his wimpy acquiescence to the horrid disrespect shown him by the Russians on repeated occasions. The other, more sinister, view I must consider is that he intentionally seeks to debase our nation in the theater of world politics for purposes of advancing his socialist agenda. Remember the basic tenet of socialism: it is a leveling of all things, including nations.

"What more graphic demonstration of the leveling of geopolitical power could there be than the leader of the world's most powerful nation-state bowing to third world tyrants?"

Gay activists make obscene gesture at Reagan White House portrait

IB Times

The Washington Times  "Matthew “Matty” Hart and Zoe Strauss, both from the Philadelphia area, posted photographs of themselves on Facebook giving the middle finger to Mr. Reagan’s official portrait hanging in the White House as they attended the party.

"At the reception, Mr. Obama told the attendees that the day is approaching when gay citizens will enjoy full equality in America." ....

"Also during the White House party where some people flipped the bird at Mr. Reagan’s portrait, a transgender man dropped down on one knee and proposed to his partner. The festivities occurred about two months after Mr. Obama announced his support for same-sex marriage."

It's come to this: Marine Corps musicians playing dance music
 for the occasion.


If you're taking part in the Gay Pride parade in Chicago this weekend, get your costumes here.

Obama Celebrity Fundraiser Barrage Worries Some in Hollywood

Hollywood Reporter, via CalChronicle  "Some of the president's most ardent entertainment industry supporters quietly tell The Hollywood Reporter that while they realize he needs to deploy all of his weapons to compete with deep-pocketed Republican super PACs, they fear the increasing reliance on stars and celebrity contests could backfire with swing voters and mobilize the right."
..." "It's a mistake," a veteran Hollywood exec says flatly of the event, which the Drudge Report headlined "Checks in the City." The exec adds: "He's supposed to be a man of the people, and he's hanging out with Anna Wintour? Is he trying to turn the election into a celebrity reality show?" ".

Reaction was particularly strong to the $40,000-a-plate dinner co-hosted June 14 by Sarah Jessica Parker and Vogue editorAnna Wintour with guests including Meryl Streep, Aretha Franklin and Bravo's Andy Cohen. Critics say the tony, heavily promoted event­ -- Parker sent an e-mail to supporters promising the evening would be "fabulous," and Wintour posted a video online urging supporters to enter a lottery for two tickets -- risked creating the impression of an elitist, out-of-touch candidate in a period of ongoing distress and growing economic inequality.

Team Obama Rallies Young Hollywood for (Yet Another) Celebrity Fund-Raiser

OBAMA CAMPAIGN: TELL YOUR WEDDING GUESTS TO SEND US MONEY  "Just when you thought the Obama campaign couldn’t get any more desperate, they come up with this: the Obama Event Registry, asking supporters who are getting married, having a birthday, or celebrating an anniversary to direct gift-givers to Obama’s re-election website:"
This from American Thinker:

MICHELLE CAMPAIGN E-MAIL: BARACK'S YOUR HUSBAND, TOO  "These personal appeals have become the desperate calling card of a sad and frightened campaign. They degrade the office of the presidency, and they mock the seriousness of American electoral politics. The entire American populace awaits with bated breath an email announcing that because Barack once bought Michelle flowers, we ought to open up our wallets for him."

HBO series "The Newsroom," gets panned

Based on Sorkin's work, he's never met ... a bona fide conservative.

But "The Newsroom" isn't persuasive. It doesn't even seem to want to persuade. It wants to preach. In this case, the choir is liberal, and the sermon is about how much smarter the choir is than that other choir across town....

"The Newsroom" newscasts quickly degenerate into McAvoy espousing almost exclusively liberal arguments (which also happen to be Sorkin's) while dismissing the conservative side -- or presenting its arguments in less than "the best possible form...."

Real journalism - the kind of deep-dive into conservative movement that the New Yorker does so well - might help liberal viewers understand what they're really up against. Instead the show invites them to throw up their hands and say, well, the other side is crazy.

That's not helpful. That's hopelessness.

"It doesn't have to be that way."

ABC'S JAKE TAPPER DISMANTLES SORKIN'S 'NEWSROOM'  "Tapper ... found himself pretty disappointed by the end result.

"Tapper's full review is well worth a read, but the highlight is how Tapper brilliantly exposes Hollywood's tired and lazy partisan ploy of using Republican characters to further a left-wing agenda.

 ....they believe that responsibility consists mostly of criticizing Republicans. This is done through the oldest trick in the book for a Hollywood liberal: by having McAvoy be a “sane Republican” who looks at his party with sadness and anger.

NY Times;  So Sayeth the Anchorman   ...."Mr. Sorkin has created his own newsroom — a Brigadoon version — where high-minded journalists pursue accuracy and excellence by, as one character puts it, “speaking truth to stupid.” "

Politico = MSNBC

Lessons in civility from Politico;  John Nolte of Breitbart:

Politico, the unofficial web-branch of MSNBC, and whose staff spends more time on MSNBC than Chris Matthews, has a so-called reporter named Joseph Williams who all but called Mitt Romney a racist on Martin Bashir's show today. 

Williams says declaratively that Romney is only comfortable around white people.

But if you think the video clip is disgraceful, wait till you see Mr. Williams' greatest tweets collection assembled below.

"Dick" jokes about Ann Romney. Really.

...."How much discussion is necessary before firing Williams?  On what planet can he be regarded as a reliable source of political reporting? The man is a hater and has a sexual fixation that is disturbing.

"There was a lot more media outrage over Neil Munro daring to ask a question of Obama. The fact that the media are not hounding this man out of the profession shows me that we can expect a lot more line crossing, targeting the Romneys for vile hatred."

Politico's suspended White House Correspondent, Joseph Williams, lashes out in a not-so-subtle way at Breitbart News.

How Long Do Canadians Wait for Healthcare?

The Daily Beast  "According to a new study by Canada's Fraser Institute, surgical waitlists are costing the nation about $1 billion each year in lost productivity. The average Canadian can now expect to wait 9.5 weeks for treatment with a medical specialist, this number up from 9.3 weeks last year."....

With more and more attention being placed on Canada’s poor productivity relative to other industrialized nations, Mr. Esmail [the author of Fraser's study] says it’s high time Canada’s leaders begin examining more efficient means of providing health care through a socialized healthcare model that operates parallel to a private care model that is open to competition (similar to the model used in Japan and numerous European nations).

Imperial Presidency

Heritage  "We can now see before us a persistent pattern of disregard for the powers of the legislative branch in favor of administrative decision-making without—and often in spite of—congressional action.  This violates the spirit—and potentially the letter—of the Constitution’s separation of the legislative and executive powers of Congress and the President.

"Examples abound:"....

The article concludes: 

"The President has unique and powerful responsibilities in our constitutional system as chief executive officer, head of state, and commander in chief. Those powers do not include the authority to make laws or to decide which laws to enforce and which to ignore. The President – like judges or Members of Congress – takes an oath to uphold the Constitution in carrying out the responsibilities of his office."

The Punk President and His ‘Gangster Government’ Go All In; Can we really survive four more years of this?  "That moniker came not from whim but from study. By Election Day in 2008, the question was no longer whether our new president was a punk. It was only whether he would only fit the word’s relatively benign definition as a “young, inexperienced person” or would be much worse than that....

"It wasn’t long before it became obvious that the country had selected the latter, after which a grievous and ongoing financial toll which continues began to accumulate."

http://townhall.com/political-cartoons/2012/06/22/100396

Selectively editing MSNBC

http://townhall.com/political-cartoons/2012/06/21/100360

Bill O'Reilly Slams MSNBC's Sneaky Editing of Romney Wawa Clip  "An Attorney General of the United States is about to be held in contempt of Congress and NBC is just finding this out now?  It is ironic when the most vilified news network in the country by the political left, also happens to be the only ones doing their job concerning reporting the state of governmental affairs.  However, I guess NBC is so good, they can’t be possibly biased."

Executive privilege in cartoons

http://www.conservativedailynews.com/category/political-cartoons/

Is President Obama A Pathological Liar?

IBD Editorials  "The Obama Record: The most frightening aspect of this president may not be his radical ideology but his rank dishonesty in selling that ideology. Now he's been caught lying about family racism."
....
"This is only the latest example of a growing body of fabrications, embellishments and outright lies told by this president, who has a real and possibly pathological problem with the truth."
"Stacked up, his whoppers would make even Bill Clinton blush. Here's a sampling:"....

Putin wants Russia to be a superpower; Obama wants to be elected

http://terrellaftermath.com/

The American Interest:  Obama Bets Ranch on Weak Syrian Hand; Putin Calls

"The Obama administration dialed up its rhetoric on Syria in recent months, but it hasn’t matched U.S. words with action. Russia has noticed the chasm between U.S. words and will and has seen an opportunity:"

Obama-Putin Meeting Brings Chill to Mexico  "The G-20 meeting was a missed opportunity to recognize that the “reset” policy has indeed reset U.S.-Russia relations—back to the Cold War—and is in dire need of reassessment. For starters, Obama should have told Putin that Russian cooperation on Iran and Syria are the litmus test of the U.S.-Russian relations.

"Unfortunately, however, the president could not do even that."