The ‘Crucify Them’ Presidency

Wall Street Journal: KIMBERLEY A. STRASSEL  "The Armendariz story matters precisely because he is the model Obama regulator. Hamstrung by both public opinion and Congress, President Obama has turned to these types to enact his broader agenda."
...."In other words, he was a perfect general for Mr. Obama’s war against natural gas. The White House is hostile to fossil fuels, yet it has been unable to get Congress or the public to act. So it has unleashed the EPA to crack down on those industries.

The bonanza in natural gas has nonetheless been tricky for the feds, since hydraulic fracturing regulation is technically left to the states. The agency’s solution has been to invent enforcement actions out of existing federal law to harass drillers."

...."Mr. Armendariz apologized for his “words,” though you might wonder why. He was picked to do a job-to “crucify” industry-and he did it. His real mistake was admitting it."  H/T to Canada Free Press

American Enterprise Institute

What the Frack? More Regs for Domestic Production  "The congressman noted the hypocrisy of Obama touting a rise in energy production while casting a shadow over the extraction method responsible for that rise.

"“In just the last month we have seen new regulations placed on the production of clean coal and natural gas,” Bishop said. 

"“We can be responsible stewards of our natural resources while also encouraging and supporting clean safe energy production on our public lands. The two are not mutually exclusive.” 

http://scottthong.wordpress.com/2007/04/20/global-warming-editorial-cartoons-pt-3/

Obama’s Disgraceful Abandonment of Chen Guangcheng

Mona Charen: China has nothing to fear from a weak and cowardly U.S. State Department.


Heritage Insider: Chen Guangcheng’s Battle Against Forced Abortion  "When Chen stood up against the ostensibly illegal but widespread use of forced sterilization and forced abortions, however, he became a target for the provincial government in Linyi, a city of 10 million people.

"Local people described women who were eight months pregnant being forced to have abortions. One or both parents of two children were forcibly sterilized, and relatives were held hostage until they complied, Chen reported. All this happened even though the government had outlawed coercion to achieve its development and population goals. […]"

LA Times: Texas pastor a key player in Chen Guangcheng case  "During the Tiananmen Square protests in 1989, Fu led a group of fellow students from Liaocheng University in Shandong. That same year, he became a Christian and held worship services at a secret "house church" with help from his wife, Heidi.

"Meanwhile, Fu taught English at a Communist Party school in Beijing. He called himself "God's double-agent." "


NY Times: The case is creating sharp new tensions in American relations with China
"It is no wonder that he took desperate measures. According to The Times, he scaled the wall around his house, gave his guards the slip and made a 300-plus-mile journey to Beijing where American diplomats are believed to be sheltering him. But there are serious concerns about what has since happened to his wife, daughter and others who aided his escape."

http://www.nationalreview.com/

Chen: From ‘Purported Diplomatic Triumph’ to ‘Diplomatic Fiasco’  "The activist against China's forced abortions calls a congressional hearing for help as new questions arise about Obama administration appeasement to the [People's Republic of China]."
....“It should have been obvious to U.S. officials all along that there is no way to guarantee Mr. Chen’s safety so long as he is within reach of the Chinese police state,” she said. “The U.S. should not have given in to Chinese pressure for Chen to be taken out of the safety of the U.S. embassy.”

Rick Moran:China might bail Obama out of dissident deal mess  "Hillary Clinton, no slouch politically, appears to be orchestrating the departure of Chinese dissident Chen Guangcheng after the State Department botched his release from the US embassy on Wednesday.
"And the Chinese, eager for their own reasons to get the incident behind them, look like they're ready to allow Chen to leave China in order to "study" abroad."


The Foreign Policy Initiative: U.S. Must Hold China to its Promises in Chen Guangcheng Case  "The Obama administration must immediately clear up any doubt about Mr. Chen’s wishes.  Moreover, the deal the U.S. struck with China regarding Chen’s “humane treatment” in future appears not to have addressed the fate of the people who helped Chen in his flight.  U.S. officials simply “raised” the issue and urged that there be no retribution against them.  Much more needs to be done for them. 

Charles Krauthammer on Obama: Divider in chief

Charles Krauthammer  "Hispanics, however, are just the beginning. The entire Obama campaign is a slice-and-dice operation, pandering to one group after another, particularly those that elected Obama in 2008 — blacks, Hispanics, women, young people — and for whom the thrill is now gone.
"What to do? Try fear. Create division, stir resentment, by whatever means necessary — bogus court challenges, dead-end Senate bills and a forest of straw men."

...."There is a problem, however. It makes a mockery of Obama’s pose as the great transcender, uniter, healer of divisions. This is the man who sprang from nowhere with that thrilling 2004 convention speech declaring that there is “not a black America and white America and Latino America and Asian America; there’s the United States of America.”

"That was then. Today, we are just sects with quarrels — to be exploited for political advantage. And Obama is just the man to fulfill Al Gore’s famous mistranslation of our national motto: Out of one, many."

Check out this post from Yahoo! Answers:

Question: Wouldn't a Cartoon of Obama being called CAPTAIN DIVIDER be funny?...

Voted best answer: "No. Humor is based on the truth. The truth is that Obama has been going out of his way to be a uniter and find bipartisan solutions to our problems. Republicans and conservative spin doctors are the dividers because they refuse to cooperate with their political opponent and prefer to engage in baseless Obama-bashing instead." Posted by "Chewy Ivan"

Sodahead

 Youtube: Obama "The Great Divider" from The Don Smith Show

How's this for unifying America?

Andrew C. McCarthy: Compulsory Blindness

NATIONAL REVIEW ONLINE    "I marched into the courtroom every day for nine months and proved that there was an undeniable nexus between Islamic doctrine and terrorism committed by Muslims. The Blind Sheikh, the jury was allowed to learn, was not a fringe lunatic; he was a globally renowned scholar of sharia whose influence over a spate of international jihadist organizations was based on his doctorate from al-Azhar University, the world’s most influential center of Islamic thought. And when I demonstrated the straight-line, undeniable logic of the evidence — that scripture informed the Blind Sheikh’s directives; that those directives informed his terrorist subordinates; and that those subordinates then committed atrocities — the government gave me the Justice Department’s highest award.

"Today, I’d be ostracized. No longer is the government content to be willfully blind. Today, it is defiantly, coercively, extortionately blind.

...."The president is purging information on which, not so long ago, juries relied to convict jihadists. Notwithstanding all its willful blindness, the government used to pass out sparkling awards to the officials who stitched that information together. Now, in the era of compulsory blindness, the government stamps “Islamophobe” on your head and hands you your walking papers."

Paul Ryan: Obama's 'Julia' website 'creepy' and 'demeaning' (Updated)

The Hill  " “It suggests that this woman can’t go anywhere in life without Barack Obama’s government-centered society. It’s kind of demeaning to her,” Ryan said during a constituent meeting in Wisconsin, the National Review reports. “She must have him and his big government to depend on to go anywhere in life. It doesn’t say much about his faith in Julia.” "

The Life of Julia  at Obama for America

" “It really shows the philosophical premise they operate from, which is — I think Romney coined it well — it’s a ‘government-centered society.’ You have to have government at every stage of your life to be there for you; otherwise, you’re going to fail. It’s promoting a cradle-to-grave welfare society,” said Ryan."

 Rick Moran: 'The Life of Zachary'  "You've no doubt heard by now "The Story of Julia" - the Obama campaign's utopian, government dependent woman who owes so much to President Obama's policies and programs.

"But what if "Julia" had a son?

" "The Life of Zachary" by Nicole Gelinas writing at City Desk:"


UPDATE: The Men in Julia’s Life  ...."Age 30: He meets a woman named Julia and they date for a while. Maybe things are turning around for him. They have sex and Julia tells him she is on the pill. A few months later, she is pregnant;  he wants to get married but she can get better treatment with child support and the government paying her way and says “hell no.” Julia sues for child support. The next thing you know, she is living well and the man in her life is living part of the time on the streets and the other part in jail since he can’t afford the $1000 a month child support payment when his business is slow."


Who the hell is "Julia," and why am I paying for her whole life?  "Julia then has a son named Zachary (who has no father around, as far as I can tell) and we can start the entire storyline again".

UPDATE: The More Precise Life of Julia; A few details left out of the Obama campaign slideshow.  ...."AGE 7:

"Under President Obama: Julia’s education is going well, and she receives a personalized form letter from president/father Obama that he is pleased with her progress. Knowing government loves and cares for her gives Julia the confidence she needs to succeed.

"Under Mitt Romney: Julia goes to a crazed Christian school, thanks to vouchers funded by cutting NPR from the budget. Republicans run rampant and cut other necessary government programs, such as cowboy poetry festivals, and young Julia shudders as she feels society collapsing around her."....Frank J. Fleming is the author of the ebook "Obama: The Greatest President in the History of Everything" ... writes columns for PJ Media and the New York Post...and can't wait until he gets his Obama-assigned composite girlfriend.

DBKP: Life With Julia: The Truth About Julia
"One aspect of Julia’s life that President Obama and the Democratic Party aren’t talking about."

Even MSNBC Rips Obama’s Creepy ‘Life of Julia’ Ad "One of the best measures for the degree of it’s backfire is when even the White House talking point network MSNBC, and especially the Obama-adoring, Democrat shill Mika Brzezinski, find fault with it:

Michelle Malkin: Mamas, Don’t Let Your Babies Grow Up to Be ‘Julia’ 

 "After hyperventilating for months about the Republican “war on women,” Democratic new-media gurus have inadvertently exposed the real Barack Obama: a chauvinistic control freak who would tether every last woman and child to his ever-expanding, budget-busting nanny state."

Rich Lowry: A Nation of Julias   "Ask not what you can do for your country; ask what your country can do for you."

....The alleged benefits to Julia are exaggerated or nonexistent. Pity the poor thing if she depends on Head Start for her launch into the world. A study by the Department of Health and Human Services last year found that positive educational effects tend to wear off by the first grade. The government assistance she gets for financing college feeds into the maw of inexorable tuition increases. The chances that the Lilly Ledbetter Fair Pay Act is going to boost her pay, as a web designer, are essentially nil. Julia is getting punked.

California-approved gun safe (Updated)

California Approved Handgun Safe

From Coiled Snake.com 
 Hat tip to Harley Standlee; Placerville, Ca

More along these same lines here:
Ann Coulter comments on the book, Negroes with guns. Written back when Democrats refused to allow blacks to own guns for protection against - as she says- Democrat organizations such as the KKK.


Other posts in the Tunnel Wall include the D-Day landings in Normandy  and the Battle of Fredericksburg in 1862. But mostly we post on politics and culture in the United States. 
Our links to history sites come from appreciation of America and how we became a nation in spite of - and sometimes because of - all our historical blemishes and triumphs. Some of it is due to sad reminiscences of where we once were and what is now becoming of us.
The Tunnel Dweller.


Meanwhile, check out the Texas Tan Line:

Obama’s second-term taxes

Dick Morris "If Obama is reelected, the tax increase he and a Democratic Congress would impose on middle- and upper-middle-income Americans would be disastrous. It’s easy to lose sight of his tax plans because he has hidden them in a variety of nooks and crannies, including the Simpson-Bowles Commission Report, the Pelosi budget of 2009 and the various tax proposals advanced by his party. But, should he win, they will all come out of hiding, and together, they will be the principal legislative thrust of his efforts in 2013.

http://danieljmitchell.wordpress.com/2011/07/11/obamas-understanding-of-taxation-captured-by-a-cartoon/

"For a couple making $250,000, these tax hikes would add another $3,000 to $4,000 a month in taxes (depending on whether they were self-employed).

"For a couple making $150,000, they would add another $1,200 to $1,400 per month.
....

"How will he tax us? Let us count the ways:" Read on...

Liberalism unleashed! SEIU, Anarchist, Occupy Training Manuals, including children’s guide to anarchy

Review Of Occupy, SEIU, Anarchist Training Manuals, Including Children’s Guide To Anarchy… "In the wake of May Day demonstrations and the string of non-peaceful action that ensued across the country, The Blaze is providing a refresher course in the tactics used by progressives, anarchists, Occupiers, the 99% Spring and labor unions in their collective push to rise up against the 1%. What follows is a collection of some of the more interesting progressive handbooks to come to light."  Read more....

CITIZEN JOURNALIST  "Perhaps the most morally offensive of them all, an anarchist’s guide book for children.  “A Rule is to Break” A Child’s Guide to Anarchy“ guides children on being their ”best self” by breaking the rules.
Here is the review written by Obama's mentor, friend and guy he knew in his neighborhood - Bill Ayres:

“. . . A delight to read! A children’s book on anarchy seems somehow just right: an instinctive, intuitive sense of fairness, community, and interdependence sits naturally enough with a desire for participatory democracy, feminism, queer-rights, environmental balance, self-determination, and peace and global justice.” — Bill Ayers, author (To Teach: The Journey in Comics and Fugitive Days), teacher, Barack Obama’s alleged terrorist pal, and grandpa.
”

I find this chilling:  "Amongst the worst,  the SEIU manual, which:

details how legal, political, media and regulatory pressure can all be exploited to manipulate employers and help the union realize its goals. It encourages, in a not-so-subtle way, the blackmailing of employers with whom it disagrees by first damaging their reputations, and encourages placing “outside pressure” to jeopardize “relationships between the employer and lenders, investors, stockholders, customers, clients, patients, tenants, politicians, or others on whom the employer depends for funds.”

One of the most telling passages of the SEIU manual reads:

It may be a violation of blackmail and extortion laws to threaten management officials with release of ‘dirt’ about them if they don’t settle a contract. But there is no law against union members who are angry at their employer deciding to uncover and publicize factual information about individual managers.

"In the wake of May Day demonstrations and the string of non-peaceful action that ensued across the country, The Blaze is providing a refresher course in the tactics used by progressives, anarchists, Occupiers, the 99% Spring and labor unions in their collective push to rise up against the 1%. What follows is a collection of some of the more interesting progressive handbooks to come to light."


'The Occupy Handbook' Features Paul Krugman, Michael Lewis, Matt Taibbi And More

"You know what those chirping birds and blooming flowers mean? It just might be warm enough to start re-occupying.  

"Now, there's now a handbook to help any of those interested."

"Let Us Help You Pack"

Sent to me by an old friend and classmate from Garibaldi, Oregon and I have chosen not to vet it any further because I like it as it is.  It came with this text:

"Let Us Help You Pack" 

FYI in case you have not seen this from a woman who lives on a small horse ranch in Western Colorado and who is married to a former US Marine, her son was a US Marine who survived Desert Storm; there are other US Marines, plus one USAF grandson, in her family tree but she is the only singer.This lady has a really good voice, and she's using it... and a really good idea!

Hat tip to George Smith, whose brother Crawford is one of the founders of Tillamook Country Smoker, makers of the most addictive beef jerky I've tried.  

Forward!

From Townhall:

Hope 'n Change

"Still, Hope n' Change can understand the appeal of the word "Forward" to Obama's campaign team. Because it's the opposite of "Rewind" - a word which would invite voters to actually review Barack Obama's disastrous, debt-ridden, America-diminishing first term. And that's certainly no way to win reelection."

Just to have a bit of fun with this:

Or not..  It's good to hear these young men aspire to excellence, but...

But one can hope one of those young men will become another Thomas Sowell and write with wisdom such as this:

There is no subject on which lies and half-truths have become so much the norm on ivy-covered campuses than is the subject of race. Moreover, anyone who even questions these lies and half-truths is almost certain to be called a "racist," especially in academic institutions which loudly proclaim a "diversity" that is confined to demographics, and all but forbidden when it comes to a diversity of ideas.

Great minds such as that of Thomas Sowell can lead us forward-  Barack Obama can only diminish this nation.

The Obamanomony as we know it

http://terrellaftermath.com/

Dismal jobs numbers  "The BLS calculates what they refer to as the Civilian Labor Force which is those who have jobs and are seeking jobs.   Those the BLS estimates are not seeking work are not included." 

Another dismal month of job creation: More unemployed give up looking for work (Updated)  "For the record, the Labor Department says the unemployment rate fell to 8.1% - down from 8.2% last month. But looking inside the numbers gives a dreary picture of what it's like to be unemployed in Obama's economy."


American Enterprise Institute:  Why the job market might not be normal until 2019 or beyond …  "As I have been pointing out, the plunging labor force participation rate has been distorting the true picture of the labor market. But economist Mike Darda of MKM Partners has a way of getting around the demographic issue by only focusing on folks during (what should be) the prime of their working life:

Obama 2012: Stealing Bush's Legacy

Pamela Geller  "For years before he became President and then on the campaign trail in 2008, Obama railed against and denounced the very policies and procedures that ultimately led to the Bin Laden kill. The capture and kill of Osama bin Laden was ten years in the making. And during those years, Barack Obama excoriated George W. Bush for "enhanced interrogation techniques" and waterboarding three (!) top jihad killers. Thousands of lives were saved, but Obama cared more about Khalid Sheikh Mohammed's sore nose. Now he is taking credit for those very things? Whiplash. How about the SEALS who took out Bin Laden? Do they deserve any credit?
"Much is made of the fact that Obama okayed the kill. Do you mean to tell me he could have said no?"

NBC's Williams In Awe of Obama's 'Even Keel' During Bin Laden Killing 
"Deputy National Security Adviser Denis McDonough replied: "As a big fan of Costco, I can confirm that we did eat Costco that night. Frankly, throughout the day." "

Bin Laden Documents Show Obama Strategy a Farce "That the Obama administration continues its ill-considered plan to “engage” the Taliban when it has zero positive to show for its efforts and against all evidence that its strategy is actively harming U.S. servicemen and the U.S. position in Afghanistan and undercutting the desired outcomes in Afghanistan, is nothing short of policy malpractice."


USS COLE COMMANDER SLAMS OBAMA AD  "“This whole thing of even putting out that ad, to me is just disgusting because you are politicizing a national security decision,” Lippold said during an interview with The Daily Caller on the one-year anniversary of bin Laden’s killing.

"“Any president that was put in that position would have probably made the difficult choice,” he said. “I don’t care what political stripe they are, they would have done it.”"