Obama diss: President snubs historic Gettysburg 150th anniversary ceremony (UPDATED)

Washington Times "It may be little more than a blip on Washington’s radar screen, but President Obama’s decision to be a no-show at an upcoming ceremony to mark the 150th anniversary of Abraham Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address has touched off a firestorm in Pennsylvania.
"Local newspapers Thursday excoriated the president, a noted admirer of the 16th president, for skipping the historic occasion.
"A journalist at Harrisburg’s Patriot News said Mr. Obama doesn’t have “the stones” to attend; York’s Daily Record newspaper called the decision “unacceptable” and said “Mr. Obama’s retreat from Gettysburg will linger long and bitter.' ”
....

Numerous Pennsylvania publications have pointed out how important it would be to have Mr. Obama, the nation’s first black commander in chief, speak in Gettysburg and remind Americans how far the nation has come since the dark days of the Civil War.

 More.

More at ABC News

Some local leaders disappointed Obama won't be at Gettysburg  This writer makes a good point: Lincoln was our greatest Republican; do we want this partisan, demagogic president using such a hallowed site to trash his enemies and promote socialism? Good riddance.
The Tunnel Dweller
" 'Gettysburg is a national treasure that doesn't belong to one party or the other," Alloway said. "However, with all the controversy surrounding him and Obamacare, it would only take away from the meaning of Remembrance Day' ."

JFK was invited to speak in 1963 but opted to visit Dallas instead.

New [guess] on Abraham Lincoln's Gettysburg photo

civilwarphotography.org

 

Lincoln's speech memorial is in the wrong spot

The witness tree in this photo that is there to this day

Looks like this tree will not witness the first black president speaking at the 150th anniversary of Lincoln's Gettysburg Address.

 

Much, much more on Gettysburg history here

 

Insurance Companies Threatened by Obama Administration

More photosnark from Rich Terrell. 

“Insurance Companies Being Told To Remain Silent About Obamacare Policy Terminations; Executives Say They Fear Retribution,” Ace writes today:

So here is the game: the White House wrote regulations to insure that the maximum number of people were terminated from their old policies, thus intentionally breaking its oft-made promise.

The White House and Democrats now wish to claim it’s the insurance companies who are doing this. 

The insurance companies would like to say that this isn’t true — that the White House is forcing them to do this, and furthermore, that they warned the White House that Obamacare regulations were forcing huge numbers of terminations — but the White House demands they be silent and take their scapegoating.

This has been the way this president works. From 2010: Obamacare silences health insurers. Sebelius threatens companies that speak out of turn    "Mrs. Sebelius tells insurers that she will show “zero tolerance” for insurers who “falsely” blame premium increases on Obamacare, and promises aggressive action against those who do:" Full article here
Obama blames 'bad apple' insurers for canceled coverage

 

 Here is that revealing video from (NOT Fox, but) CNN exposing this: 

Bob Laszewski who heads the Health Policy Strategy Associates, a consulting firm for big insurers, and an outspoken critic of ObamaCare, says he is getting calls from these executives who want him to speak out, Anderson, for them about the problems because they feel defenseless against the White House PR team. Laszewski told me today, “The White House is exerting massive pressure on the industry, including the trade associations, to keep quiet.” Sources telling us they fear White House retribution. 

THE 4 HORSEWOMEN OF THE BARACKOLYPSE: AND THE WINNERS ARE:

Astute Bloggers

 

#4 - MICHELLE "LET ME EAT CAKE" OBAMA  14.18% 

#3 - NANCY "WE HAVE TO PASS IT TO FIND OUT WHAT'S IN IT" PELOSI  18.22% 

#2 - HILLARY "BENGHAZI" CLINTON  21.27%

#1 - VALERIE "RASPUTINA" JARRETT  22%

Never before have so few women done so much harm to so great a nation...

The Obamacare pig needs a lot more than lipstick

Galen Institute; The administration’s audacious blame game  "The White House is trying to shift responsibility to health insurance companies for forcing people out of their existing health plans, but the companies are required to discontinue these plans to comply with the president’s health law.

"The administration is trying to deflect Americans’ rightful anger over losing the health plans they were promised they could keep, but the strategy of shifting blame flies in the face of the facts." ...

 

No Such Thing as a Free Lunch   "Obamacare came about because people were willing to make slight changes to the health-care system because of concerns over the uninsured. Only 44 percent of the respondents were satisfied with the “overall quality of the American health care system,” but this was out of concern for what they thought was happening to others, not their own health care." 

Time to use the f-word about Obamacare  The word is "fraud." It is now clear that the American people and their representatives in Congress were lied to, in order to obtain passage of Obamacare. When someone is induced to undertake an action based on false representations, that constitutes fraud. Investor's Business Daily  lays out the calculation that motivated the fraud."

 

 Democratic Senator Jumps Ship  "Landrieu to introduce bill to keep Obamacare promise of "if you like your health plan, you can keep it' ."

 

Happy Halloween! Obamacare: It Was A Graveyard Smash

Weasel Zippers

From Watchdog.org:  "Happy Halloween and Happy Obamacare enrollment period!"

Obamacare Navigator Hasn't Signed Up Anyone Because It's Too Expensive

"Thus far everybody has taken a look at the rates and they've walked out the door."

The Weekly Standard,  "Al Jazeera finds an Obamacare navigator in Colorado who hasn't signed up anybody for the new program because it's too expensive:"

Sharyl Attkisson: Insurance 'Death Spiral' Could Cause ObamaCare's 'Collapse'

"Besides facing a "credibility death spiral" on the issue of ObamaCare, as political director John Dickerson recently put it, Sharyl Attkisson pointed out on Tuesday's CBS Evening News that the very structure of the so-called reform could encounter a separate "death spiral" due to the "enrollment fiasco" surrounding HealthCare.gov." More. 

Obamacare Didn’t Cancel Your Plans. He blames it on insurance companies and threatens them if they speak out

Be very afraid of this man.

 

 

Obama and Sebelius: Obamacare Didn’t Cancel Your Plans  "But President Obama and Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius are now denying this.

"Yesterday, they both came out publicly to tell America that it’s not Obamacare that’s causing you to receive a cancellation notice—it’s your insurance company.
"Obama called insurance plans that are getting canceled “substandard” and said people could actually keep those plans if insurers still offered them (which they can’t under the President’s health care law). He said those plans are getting canceled only if “insurers decided to downgrade or cancel these substandard plans” (which they must under the law)."

Well, I guess. My wife and I are in our seventies and have just discovered after all these years that our Blue Cross/ Blue Shield plan covers neither birth control nor prenatal care.

Obama re-demonizes insurance industry  I'm glad to never have been a coworker with Obama in the private sector, aren't you? Can you imagine how he would be in the boss's office, blaming you for everything that went wrong?
During my working years, we referred to people like that as "weasels" and "backstabbers". The Tunnel Dweller

"We reported on this before.  Health insurance execs afraid to talk on record about Obamacare computer problems.
"CNN reports today, White House Pressuring Insurance Companies To Not Criticize ObamaCare:"   Emphasis added.

Thank these Republicans for Obamacare

Ann Coulter  "We have Obamacare for one reason and one reason only: For a brief, ghoulish period in recent history, Democrats controlled the White House, the Senate, and the House of Representatives.
"We don’t have Obamacare because the public was clamoring for it. We have it because Republicans lost elections."  Full Article.
....
"When your new health insurance premiums arrive in the mail, and you can’t find a doctor in your plan who speaks English, tell me the fight between Republicans and Democrats is not that important."

eaglerising.com

Halloween and Obamacare

 

 

 

 

 

 

Watcher’s Council Nominations – ObamaCare Trick Or Treat Edition 

The World's Most Powerful People 2013 (UPDATED)

Forbes

"Who’s more powerful: the autocratic leader of a former superpower or the handcuffed commander in chief of the most dominant country in the world? This year the votes for the World’s Most Powerful went to Russian President Vladimir Putin. He climbs one spot ahead of U.S. President Barack Obama, who held the title in 2012."....

UPDATE: Is Putin Really More Powerful Than Obama?   "The second and far bigger point is that Barack Obama is weak internationally by choice. At home he’s amassing immense, unprecedented powers over the economy."...



....
"Internationally, however, Obama is the weakest President of the post-World War II years."  (Emphasis added, TD)

The President Who Has Done the Most Damage

"The only question is whether it can ever be undone. "

iowntheworld.com

Dennis Prager   ...."But I have never written or broadcast that our country was being seriously damaged by a president. So it is with great sadness that I write that President Barack Obama has done and continues to do major damage to America. The only question is whether this can ever be undone."....

"....Nearly everything he has touched has been made worse.
"He did, however, promise before the 2008 election that “We are five days away from fundamentally transforming the United States of America.” That is the one promise he has kept."

The bystander president

More Photosnark from Rich Terrell

Terrell Aftermath

NY Times: Where the Buck Stops, Some See a Bystander  "President Obama finds himself under fire on two disparate fronts these days, both for the botched rollout of his signature health care program and for the secret spying on allied heads of state. In both instances, his explanation roughly boils down to this: I didn’t know."

Controversies show how Obama’s inattention to detail may hurt his presidential legacy    From Hot Air: "Let’s start with the latter example from Scott Wilson, whose posits that talking big and having no interest in doing the necessary work forms a coherent management philosophy:"....

 

Reposted from an earlier TW:  Victor Davis Hanson: Is Obama Still President?   "His cadences soar on, through scandal after fiasco after disaster."

 

­What didn’t the president know, and why didn’t he know it?   "Once you lose a reputation for competence, it is hard to get back. And much of the media are now depicting Obama as less than a hands-on leader.
"Take this slap in the face:
“ 'For a smart man, President Obama professes to know very little about a great number of things going on in his administration.' ”  Dana Milbank of the WaPo.

Obama just got used to saying things that were never challenged  "President, and before, candidate Obama had the benefit of saying things that the media never challenged.  It's true that they were challenged by the GOP but that is partisan.  What we did not have was an aggressive, but respectful media."