Saturday, October 8, 2011

Ten Lessons from Obama

Victor Davis Hanson  "The election of Barack Obama brought all sorts of contradictions. A man with about the least prior executive experience in presidential history was suddenly acclaimed a “god” and the smartest man ever to assume the office."
....
"In less than three years, however, the Obama administration has established a far different legacy from the one it promised, and the lessons of 2009–2011 will be with us for a long time:"

....
"A sadder but wiser electorate in 2012 simply won’t believe that any candidate — Democrat or Republican — can cool the planet or stop the seas from rising. Barack Obama taught us that — and a lot more besides."


 

The Meaning of ‘Occupy Wall Street.’ The Confusion on the Left and the Right

Ron Radosh   And those rough edges are there. Watch any of the video reports on MSNBC, which has virtually camped out there during its evening prime time coverage by the likes of Ed Schultz and the rest of its left-leaning team, and you will see a conglomeration of younger people in their 20s and 30s. There is also a strange amalgamation of leftover hippies from the ’60s and some who appear to be truly bizarre, as well as scores of extreme left radical groups from organizations as diverse as anarchists, members of the Industrial Workers of the World ...and, of course, an assortment of every remaining communist and socialist grouplet with their own signs and propaganda."

The "Occupy Wall Street Movement" Synthesizing With The Arab Spring?


"Is it any surprise that an effigy of Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein’s bloody severed head on a pike was paraded around for protestors to cheer?"

PROLIFERATION EXPERT: WINDOW OF OPPORTUNITY FOR AN EFFECTIVE ATTACK AGAINST IRAN'S NUKE PROGRAM IS CLOSING

Bosch Fawstin illustration
The Jerusalem Post  "US Secretary of Defense Leon Panetta’s visit to Israel last week, Cohen said, was likely part of an American effort to ensure that Israel is not planning any unilateral military steps that would not be coordinated first with Washington.
"“The US wants itself, and also Israel, to be engaged in a thorough effort to contain Iran – like the way the Soviet Union was contained during the Cold War – meaning that for all practical purposes and short of extreme circumstances, both the US and Israel would have to put aside the military option and instead work to contain Iran,” Cohen said.
Kucinich
"“My gut sense is that something happened in recent weeks which was interpreted as if Israel had made clear that the military option is alive and kicking, and Panetta wanted to make sure that Israeli independent action will not happen,” he said."

And America- which elects leaders like Obama, Bernie Sanders, Dennis Kucinich and the California legislature- will stand behind Israel and protect her?

The demagogue in the White House and his fellow travelers

White House feeds off protest anger  "But increasingly their targets are also those of the White House – what the movement calls “the 1 per cent” – wealthy Americans whose taxes Mr Obama wants to raise to pay for his programme to boost jobs.
"“I am more disappointed in the parties than I am in (Mr Obama),” said Mr Casey."

Now we see the influences of Bill Ayres and Rev Wright manifesting themselves in this White House. The class warfare and the distrust of the very economic engines that made America the driving force of the western world and of our prosperity. If you have a 401k that is helping you through tough times, places to shop with full shelves and a home full of conveniences, you have Wall Street and private enterprise to thank for that.
We spent this nation's blood and treasure for half of the Twentieth Century keeping Communism and socialism away from America and now, with the help of the entertainment industry and a socialist-leaning press, we have willingly invited it into our house. TD

The Occupy St. Louis protesters call independent journalist Adam Sharp a faggot and then threaten to beat his a$$.  "Of course, it was all caught on tape."

Local Residents, Businesses Want #OccupyWallSt to End  "Both Ms. Tzortzatos, owner of the Panini and Company Cafe, and Mr. Keane said the protesters rarely bought anything, yet hurled curses when they were told that only paying customers could use their bathrooms.
"Steve Zamfotis, manager of another nearby store, Steve’s Pizza, said: “They are pests. They go to the bathroom and don’t even buy a cup of coffee.”
"Mr. Zamfotis closed his bathroom after it repeatedly flooded from protesters’ bathing there."

Complaints arise on Wall Street protesters, dilemma of dealing with them

CBS News: The scene on the ground  "Almost no one at the protest seemed to have much positive to say about President Obama and the Democratic Party, which was described as only slightly less corrupt and focused on helping the rich than the GOP. They also had little positive to say about the "corporate media," which they said was unwilling to tell Americans the truth."

Stinking up Wall Street: Protesters accused of living in filth as shocking pictures show one demonstrator defecating on a POLICE CAR
Raw sewer: An unidentified man seen defecates on a NYPD patrol car in downtown Manhattan

And these are the people who called the TEA Party protestors a mob? The very chutzpah of the left!

Wall Street and its Occupiers

‘Occupy Wall Street’ is ‘Attack upon Freedom’  "Labor unions, he said, are now joining the protest to “subvert that anger into a political power.” Their aim is to reelect a president whose “policies are just ignorant and incompetent” about the economy, he said.
"“This president and his administration have policies that are taking our freedom away,” Broun said. “They’re killing our economy, they’re killing jobs, they’re running them over offshore. We need to change all that. If we don’t, this economy is going to have a bigger crash than we did in the Great Depression.”
"“This election is going to mean whether we’re going to go down the tube financially,” he added."
Via Boortz here and below.

Political Cartoons by Eric Allie


Obama, Democrats Plan to Tie GOP to Wall Street "The burgeoning of populist protests in New York and other cities shows that resentment over the economy is growing, and Democratic strategists are moving aggressively to show that President Obama and his party are taking steps to solve the problem while Republicans are standing in the way." Also here. And Bill Ayers weighs in with his thoughts.

Political Cartoons by Michael Ramirez

Argus Hamilton at The Patriot Post  "New York's Occupy Wall Street protesters argued among themselves about whether they should sew their own sleeping bags with winter coming or engage in capitalism and buy them. Also, they argued over whether to beg for food or buy donuts. It took two hours in the real world to convert the entire movement to supply-side economics."

White House Spokesman Calls the Tea Party a Mob  "White House Press Secretary Jay Carney said in the briefing today."
"“I sense a little hypocrisy unbound here–what we’re seeing on the streets of New York is a an expression of democracy,” Cantor said. “I think I remember how Mr. cantor described protests of the tea party–I can’t understand how one man’s mob is another man’s democracy.”
"Cantor, of course, was an ardent supporter of the tea party, praising its protests and rabble-rousing."


Protesting for the problem they’re against    "The only people that are helped by government intervention are large companies and politicians. Small companies and consumers take the hit, consumers in paying higher prices and small companies by being pushed out of the market. It seems that the protesters are protesting for what they claim to be against. Economics and civics are complicated and the people funding these protests rely on those who join them to be too lazy or ignorant to understand either. For now it looks like they are right."

Friday, October 7, 2011

The wages of Obama's - and Occupy Wall Street's - class warfare rhetoric

Rick Moran "President Obama's harsh rhetoric directed against the rich is bearing fruit. Several New York state lawmakers have received an email that says, in essence, "kill the rich:"
"Several influential New York lawmakers have received threatening emails saying it is "time to kill the wealthy" if they don't renew the state's tax surcharge on the millionaires, according to reports."
Thank you to Obama and his liberals for the demagoguery.




Wall Street Protestors Have Met the Enemy and It Is They

David P. Goldman "The fact is that no-one likes a fast buck more than the American public. Wall Street was the enabler, but Main Street was the addict. Americans stopped saving as long as home prices rose; when home prices started to fall, they started saving again.
"That is why the Wall Street protesters are foolish and petulant. American households levered a $6 trillion net inflow of foreign savings during the decade 1998 through 2007 into a bubble that benefited them far more than it did Wall Street. "

Obama Confirms Fears About New Financial Regulator  "In so doing, the President confirmed fears that the new agency would be a free-ranging political tool pursuing populist ideological goals. Even other financial regulators have been wary of its open-ended power, concerned that it will undercut their efforts to ensure economic stability. The President’s call to action should add to their concerns."

An Open Letter to the Self-Proclaimed ’99%’  "So the 99 percenters need to do a few things, in my opinion. First, they need to put aside the notion that the world owes them a job. It doesn’t, and never did. They need to assess what makes them worth hiring, and then act accordingly. If you don’t have any marketable skills, get some. They need to put aside the delusion that they represent 99 percent of their fellow Americans. They don’t and never will. They need to come to grips with the fact that their unrealistic view of the world is not only getting in their way, it’s a big part of what has made our economy as weak as it is.


"Will they 99 percenters heed any of this? Eh, at most maybe one percent will. It’s best to keep our expectations realistic."

George Will: Elizabeth Warren and liberalism, twisting the ‘social contract’

George F. Will  "Elizabeth Warren, Harvard law professor and former Obama administration regulator (for consumer protection), is modern liberalism incarnate. As she seeks the Senate seat Democrats held for 57 years before 2010, when Republican Scott Brown impertinently won it, she clarifies the liberal project and the stakes of contemporary politics.
"The project is to dilute the concept of individualism, thereby refuting respect for the individual’s zone of sovereignty. The regulatory state, liberalism’s instrument, constantly tries to contract that zone — for the individual’s own good, it says."

Thursday, October 6, 2011

The Ladies of the View

Ann Coulter: This Is What a Mob Looks Like

Ann Coulter  "I am not the first to note the vast differences between the Wall Street protesters and the tea partiers. To name three: The tea partiers have jobs, showers and a point."....

http://townhall.com/political-cartoons/ericallie
"The modern tea partiers never went around narcissistically comparing themselves to Gen. George Washington. And yet they are the ones who have engaged in the kind of political activity Washington fought for.
...."The tea partiers didn't arrogantly claim to be drafting a new Declaration of Independence. They're perfectly happy with the original.
"Tea partiers didn't block traffic, sleep on sidewalks, wear ski masks, fight with the police or urinate in public. They read the Constitution, made serious policy arguments, and petitioned the government against Obama's unconstitutional big government policies, especially the stimulus bill and Obamacare.
"Then they picked up their own trash and quietly went home. Apparently, a lot of them had to be at work in the morning."

From Hero-Worship to Celebrity-Adulation

The Weekly Standard  "....It’s the two young Marines in Iraq who made a split-second decision in the last moments of their lives to open fire on a truck hurtling toward the compound where they were standing guard, thereby preventing the bomb-laden vehicle from entering before it blew up and so saving the lives of their sleeping comrades. It’s all those willing to risk their lives to save the lives of others.
"Celebrities may think adulation is their due and that special rules apply to them. On the latter point, they may be right. But real heroes of the kind who risk their lives for others do not demand adulation. On the contrary, they more often than not rush to deny that there is anything special about who they are. They specifically disavow any status of superiority as a result of their heroic deeds."

Postmodern Class Warfare

Victor Davis Hanson   "And when we really do see street violence — looting in Britain or flash-mobbing in America — angry youths usually target high-end electronics stores and fashion outlets, not food markets or bookstores. They organize on social networks from their laptops and cell phones, not from soup kitchens, bread lines or dank basements.
"Class warfare is now not about brutal elemental poverty of the sort Charles Dickens or Knut Hamsun once wrote about. It is too often the anger that arises from not having something that someone else has, whether or not such style, privilege or discretionary choices are all that necessary. Endemic obesity, not malnutrition, threatens America — including the nearly 50 million Americans who are on food stamps."