Obama Listens...With His Mouth

President Obama held his Summit yesterday. It was billed as a bipartisan meeting to hash out health care issues. Many wondered if this would just be political theater for Obama to get the American people behind him and his health care plan.

Obama was going to moderate and listen to see if he could get some good ideas from the Republicans and in front of the camera's, and hopefully some bipartisan support for his health care plan. That's how it was billed.

The Republicans came prepared. They took the President at his word and they prepared to make their case in front of Obama, in front of the Democrats and in front of the nation. The news organizations were thrilled. They were going to get to see Obama perform his magic on camera for 6 hours and lead a bipartisan campaign to get health care revived from the dead and back front and center before the nation. President Obama wanted to show he was willing to work with the Republicans. Oh happy day!!

But then the President wouldn't shut up. The more he said, the worse it got for him. The Republicans had facts. They had figures. They had examples, both good for what they were proposing and examples of bad situations to support their position of no takeover of health care by the government. They were calm, succinct and straightforward.

The all stars for the Republicans were Senator Lamar Alexander who asked the President to scrap the current bills and start over. Senator Tom Coburn who pointed out the 33% waste in current government health plans that could save billions of dollars. Representative Paul Ryan who not only pointed out that the current plan was a ponzi scheme but that the current bills actually count dollars twice to make it look deficit neutral when in fact it isn't. He said that these bills the Democrats voted on and passed, were so shaky they'd make Bernie Madoff proud. Eric Cantor and John Kyl also made salient points.

The Republicans took the offer of the summit seriously. they brought in their facts, figures and examples. The Democrats brought in stories from constituents and childish barbs. Obama responded to many including Alexander, Ryan and Kyl. He tried to berate Cantor for having a copy of the 2,400 page Senate bill in front of him saying that props don't help move a conversation forward. Meanwhile, Cantor had the bill open and read from it when giving his answer to the Democrat plan.

The low point had to be Senator McCain calling Obama out on his pledge of transparency and on the backroom deals to which Obama tried to put McCain down by saying that the election was over and nothing would come from replaying the election.

When they broke for lunch, the news organizations were no longer interested. Fox News went to their normal programming. CNN went to Wolf Blitzer and his interviews of other members of Congress. Even MSNBC moved away from the summit and they moved away from it before any of the others.

For a man that wanted to listen to both sides and come out with a bill that could be bipartisan, Obama proved that his ears don't do the listening. His mouth does. The Democrats, not including Obama spoke for 114 minutes. The Republicans spoke for 110 minutes and Obama spoke for 119 minutes! One man spoke more than either of the two parties. There were 17 Republicans, 21 Democrats and Obama outspoke them all. Not one Democrat came prepared for this summit with any facts or figures. Nothing to back up their position.

When the news quit carrying the summit, the only way to catch it was through the computer. Nobody, not one person, said that it was a slam dunk for Obama. The consensus was that the Republicans revitalized themselves with the American people in that summit.

When the summit was over, the talk was that the Democrats were now going to go to the nuclear option. Reconciliation. They now know that they won't get any Republicans on board. So the only way that they can get this through is to use the Reconciliation and with the hoops they need to jump through to get that far, it's even less likely than it was a week ago when people declared it dead, that it would ever get through.

If people were going to use yesterdays summit as a way to choose their next elected official, not many Democrats would be re-elected. If the Democrats somehow manage to get the nuclear option through, this fall will be a mass slaughter of Democrats in the voting. If the Democrats try and fail to get the nuclear option through, Republicans are still in a good position to retake both the House and Senate.

Yesterday was a day for Obama's teleprompter to tell him "better to be silent and thought the fool than to open your mouth and remove all doubt."

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Health Care Summit: Two purposes

I wasted three hours watching the health care summit this morning. What I learned is that there are two purposes.

Republicans:

The Republicans showed up with their first team including three doctors. Before even getting to the doctors Senator Lamar Alexander led off for the Republicans and made it clear that the Republicans want to scrap the current Senate and House plans and begin anew from scratch.

Senator Colburn, a doctor, laid out the cost problems. The fact that 33% of all health care dollars were wasted dollars and don't go towards caring for health.

Senator Kyl pointed out the waste in the bill.

Democrats:

President Obama led off with a long speech about finding the common agreements between the two parties, then began to outline where he considers that Republicans agree with the Democrats. He, Senator Max Baucus and a myriad of others all spoke with smiles on their faces saying that the differences were very minute and could be overcome, then went on to say that their plan was the answer.

Substance:

Most of the speakers on both sides spent a tremendous amount of time explaining why the "summit" was taking place but said little else.

Senator Kyl had the 2,400 page Senate bill in front of him. Representative Cantor had the 2,400 Senate bill in front of him.

Senator Kyl and Representative Cantor both pointed to parts of the bill that Republicans just cannot agree with and suggested starting from scratch.

Barbs:

Two notable barbs came from the two former candidates. Senator McCain started off quoting Candidate Obama and made a point of saying it was their campaign. Then he pointed out the backroom deals such as the Louisiana Purchase and the Cornhusker Kickback. He could have done that more effectively without talking about the campaign. He came off as bitter about the election which took away from his otherwise honest and relevent argument about the backroom deals.

The other notable barb came from President Obama. He called on Representative Cantor to speak and then immediately interrupted him and picked at him abit for having the bill in front of him as if it was there just for effect. To be above what he called "political talking points" he could have kept his mouth shut about that. He also had another where Senator Kyl said that the difference between the proposed Senate plan and the Republicans plan was do you want Washington to make decisions or people to make their own decisions. Obama said that that was a political talking point or code word.

At the lunch break, Politico.com wrote that Democrat Strategists said that this summit was to show the American people that Republicans agreed with Democrats and that would allow them to push the plan through using the reconciliation process which didn't need any Republican support.

So the Republicans went in with good faith and gave substantive arguments while the Democrats, almost to a man said (Hoyer, Schumer, Obama, and others) we seem to agree very closely with the Republicans or in Obama's case, "that's in our bill" each time the Republicans made a point.

Good that came from the morning session:

The Democrats admitted almost immediately that the Republicans had several plans out there and that the Democrats had reviewed it. Which is odd because they've been claiming for over a year that the Republicans don't have a plan and have never submitted a plan. Since they've now admitted that this isn't true, I wonder if that makes them liars.

Apparently, Senator Judd Gregg said it correctly to Greta Van Susteren the other night when he said he declined an invitation to attend the summit because it would be a kabuki dance.

Your comments are welcome.

Brett

Obama Sets Roadmap for Tax Increases

President Obama set in motion his plan to increase taxes. If you'll remember during the campaign he said on more than one occasion (actually just about every speech he made) that anyone making less than $250,000 per year would not see their taxes increase, not even one dime.

After failing to get the Debt Commission approved in the Senate a few weeks ago, he said he was going to sign an Executive Order to create this commission and yesterday he did just that. We all know that when a commission is set up for any purpose, that commission makes the recommendation that the sitting President wants recommended. In other words, this is for show.

Obama and the congress is letting the Bush tax cuts expire. Those tax cuts expire on December 31, 2010. So beginning on January 1 tax rates will increase. Democrats like to say that they aren't increasing but rather they are being returned to rates that President Reagan put in place. Since President Bush had tax rates reduced in 2001 and again in 2003, the expiration of those tax cuts means that we're getting a tax hike. You can put earrings on a pig, but you still have a pig.

Bush's tax cuts created record amounts of revenue coming into the government. Due to those tax cuts, the economy took off to heights not seen in 25 years. Unemployment was at or below 5%, which is considered full employment.

Unfortunately, that excess revenue was then spent by the Congress. It wasn't all applied to the debt, and while it reduced the deficit in 2006, the spending increases caused the deficit to increase again.

Obama is a tax and spend Democrat. He's tripled the debt in his one year in office and quadrupled the deficit from the record highs set by the Bush Administration. This commission that he created is being headed by Erskine Bowles (former advisor to President Clinton) and (former) Senator Alan Simpson. Obama appointed four people of his choice. The Republicans will appoint six and the Democrats will appoint six.

Obama says he's forcing this to be bi-partisan by saying that they must have 14 of the commissioners in agreement on a solution to reduce the debt. To reach the 14, he will have to have some Republicans agree on the plan that they come out with.

This will do a couple of things. First, it will allow Obama to say "it's not my fault, the commission is recommending this and Republicans 0n the commission were in agreement. Second, it will allow Congress to say that this isn't their idea, but rather that of the commission so it shouldn't be held against Congress.

Finally, they are required to have their report out by December 1, of this year. That's AFTER the election. So even if the people aren't fooled by the so-called bi-partisanship, they have no recourse for two more years.

So while the Bush tax cuts expire, we can expect an increase in taxes over and above the increase from the expiration of the Bush tax cuts. Obama believes that we can tax our way out of the recession and into prosperity despite the long list of failures by everyone that's tried it in various states and in the Federal government. It's never worked and it will never work.

He's provided cover for himself to get away from his promise of no new taxes nor tax increases on anyone earning less than $250,000 per year.

I believe that the people will not be fooled and that this underscores the need for Conservatives to be voted in come November. That can stop these tax increases. It won't stop the expiration of the Bush tax cuts (unless a miracle happens and the Republicans get a veto proof majority), but those elections should be able to stop additional taxes being put on the American people.

This will be a job killer and decrease revenue to the government causing them to want more taxes to cover their bills.

Following the election in November, it will then be up to us to keep our elected officials feet to the fire so that Republicans that will be elected in droves this fall don't go along with the tax increases but push hard to bring spending down. This means eliminating some expenses as well as reducing the spending in other areas.

As this is going on, and Obama is bragging about freezing spending (beginning next year) for three years, he's out in Nevada handing out another $1.5 Billion.

We can't trust what Obama says. We can only watch what he does. What he is doing is talking out of one side of his mouth and doing something else from the other side. This just shows the desperate need we have to elect Conservatives.

If Obama really wants to do something constructive, he might want to take a course on managing a checkbook.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

The Coming Juggernaut

More and more Democrats are dropping out of both Houses of Congress. The two most recent were Patrick Kennedy from the House and Evan Bayh from the Senate. Bayh was in danger of losing the seat in November despite his saying that he doesn't like the way that Washington is being run. He was only up by 3 points in the polls and those didn't include his most serious challenger, Dan Coates.

The Democrats are in trouble in the midterm elections. Yes, the party in power usually loses seats in the midterms, but this year could very well turn out to be more of a massacre than it was in 1994 when Newt Gingrich nationalized the elections and the Republicans took over the House with the Contract with America.

Several months ago, Dick Morris, former aide to President Clinton, predicted that the House and the Senate would go to Republican majorities and was laughed at even by conservatives. He is now looking like a prophet. There are 12 and possibly 13 Senate seats now held by Democrats that could be won by Republicans.

Coast to coast Democrats are in trouble. Barbara Boxer in California is being seriously challenged, as is Patty Murray in Washington. Harry Reid is way behind in Nevada and even his son is saying that it might be good for him to not run again. If Tommy Thompson, former Governor of Wisconsin, decides to run for the Senate, Russ Feingold will likely lose.

We've already seen a Republican win the seat held by Ted Kennedy until his death last year. Vice President Joe Bidens son dropped out of his race for the seat formerly held by his father. There are four Republicans beating Blanche Lincoln in the polls in Arkansas.

But it's not just Democrats that are in trouble. It's anyone that is not Conservative. Charlie Crist in Florida, a Republican, is down to Marco Rubio a Conservative Republican and now John McCain is being seriously challenged by Conservative JD Hayworth in Arizona.

All of this is happening before the Republicans have put out their unified plan that is expected. Similar to the Contract with America in 1994. Should this continue, and I believe it will, what will the pundits say the people are voting for? Likely they will say that the people of this country are choosing gridlock over governing. It's already being hinted at by Obama and the Democrats. They are claiming that the Republicans blocked the "important" legislation of the past year. There is just one problem with that argument. It's been mathematically impossible for the Republicans to obstruct anything over the past 12 months.

The Democrats have the majority in the House where a simple majority passes legislation. They have had 60 votes in the Senate where they need a minimum of 60 votes to pass anything. Yet, the Democrats shot themselves in the foot by holding backroom meetings on Health Care Reform. They couldn't get Cap and Trade passed. Republicans had nothing to do with the Democrats failure because they couldn't stop anything.

This election coming up is now in the Republicans control. They can be satisfied with the gains they've made just from the Democrats failures or they can try to put the Democrats away with a powerful message feeding on the dissatisifaction of the American people and put together a plan similar to the Contract with America and take even more seats than what they seem to be headed for now.

I believe that they should follow the latter plan. If the election were to be held today, they would likely take over the majority of both Houses. They should build on that and shoot not just for the majority, but fight for a veto proof majority. It's a lofty goal and maybe not achievable, but they certainly can't achieve it if they don't try for it. This is an opportunity that they shouldn't pass up.

The Republicans have the ability to pick up as many as 13 seats in the Senate. There are 36 seats up for election in November. All of the House seats are open in November as the House has just two year terms. As it is now, they could gain anywhere from 50 to 65 seats. Again, if they aim for a higher figure, you just never know how many more they could gain.

I hope the Republicans come out with a plan that they can all sign on to and hopefully increase those seats. A veto proof majority should be the goal whether they can reach it or not. You can't reach the impossible if you don't try for the impossible. After all, it was just a year ago that I doubt anyone would have expected to see a billboard of former President Bush asking if he was missed.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Snotty Obama Remains Defiant

Remember when Presidents used to get up to the Podium for the State of the Union and run through the issues using the previous years events and the future plans for that particular topic? You could almost follow as he went from one Cabinet Office to the next. President Obama's speech did not do that. Remember when the Presidents would praise Americans and American ingenuity and American businesses? Obama's speech did not do that.

He spent most of his time trying not to break his arm as he patted himself on the back but even those things that he was patting himself on the back for were false. Just a bit of a rehash here from the last time I wrote on here. I said that Obama would talk about himself. He used the terms "I", 'me", "my" by my count 91 times. Others on news programs last night said he used it 96 times. I also said that he would blame the bad things on former President Bush. To be fair, anyone could have predicted that and everyone did. What surprised me was that it took him only about two minutes to do that and then interspersed it into the rest of his speech several more times.

Obama started off his speech with how he inherited economic problems;bad behavior on Wall St.; partisanship; Banks caused the crisis; how he hated the bank bailout. Not one mention of the housing market or how Fannie and Freddie were responsible for the economic problems of the past year. Instead he chose to blame Wall St. and the banks.

Obama claimed that this was all here before he "walked in the door". He stated that the deficit was already over $1 Trillion. This was blatantly false! When President Bush left office the deficit was at $540 Billion.

From there his topics were the following: 1. Jobs Bill, 2. Financial Reform, 3. Clean Energy, 4. Education, 5. Health Reform, 6. Freeze in spending, 7. Lack of Trust of American People, 8. Earmark Reform, 9. Bipartisanship again 10. Patriotism, 11. Nuclear Weapons Reduction, 12. Haiti, 13. Civil Rights, 14. Immigration, 15. Faith lost in Corporations, media and Government 16. Haiti again 17. Wrap up.

I am not going to review all of those here. I am going to talk about a couple of things though.

1. Spending

2. Health Insurance

3. BiPartisanship

4. National Security.

1. Spending

He proposed a freeze in spending. Not now, but beginning next year. However, he proposed spending more money on a Jobs bill, which is nothing more than a sequel to last years failed stimulus bill. He proposed spending on education in the form of tax credits and then forgiving the debt after ten years and sooner if they go into community service. In all, he wants to freeze spending but spend another $150 billion.

2. Health Care Reform

Obama pretty much repeated what he said last year. If you have a better idea, he'll listen. But last year, the Republicans came out with proposals and were left standing outside of a locked door. Obama and the Democrats would not listen to the Republicans. Instead they claimed that the Republicans would not come in and had no proposals. In fact, the Republicans did put out proposals and did offer to sit with the President and his minions to put forth their proposals. But they weren't allowed in.

I'm really curious about this "better idea" statement of Obama's. Who determines if it's a better idea? Him? We've already seen his ideas and the American people didn't like it. 65% of the people in this country did not like the health care plans passed in the House and the Senate.

But during the speech Obama said that the reason that the American people didn't like the Health Care bill was because the debate went on too long and the people were confused by what was in it. This is arrogance at it's height. The people rejected the bill because they had to pay taxes four years before the bill would even be available to them. They rejected it because they don't want government involved in their choices for health care. They rejected it because they didn't want to be thrown in jail if they didn't get health care. WE rejected it because we don't want to see rationing of health care like happens all around the world where they have government run health care.

3. BiPartisanship

This topic was at the beginning of his speech, and interspersed throughout his speech and he ended with it as well. He said that people didn't trust government. He finally got something right. But Obama even managed to insert some partisanship, and downplay the partisanship and give directions of how bipartisanship should be handled or not be handled.

For example, at one point, when talking about the lack of trust in government, he said that the American people don't trust Corporations, media and Government. He then bashed the corporations for making profits and paying bonuses. He bashed the media for their constant yelling back and forth and inciting people against one side or the other. But when it came to government, he talked about lobbyists and how he had the most transparent White House in history.

I actually burst out laughing when he said that about the transparency. I immediately remembered that Vice President Joe Biden held two meetings on Transparency. One as recently as last week. Both of the meetings were closed to the public! Transparency in this administration is a complete lie. Do we have to be reminded that even C-span was denied access to the Health Care negotiations? You really have to go to great lengths to get C-Span to comment in public. This was even after Obama had promised in previous speeches to put the negotiations on C-Span.

In the midst of his discussion about about Deficit of Trust from Americans regarding government, he slid off to talk about the recent Supreme Court decision on campaign finance reform. He actually trashed the Supreme Court during a State of the Union speech! I cannot remember a President ever doing that in my lifetime. I have not been able to find a state of the union speech where any President ever said anything about the Supreme Court in a negative fashion. In addition, he didn't tell the truth while bashing the Supreme Court. Obama said that foreign interests would now have access to our elections with their funding. This is not true of the Supreme Court decision.

This is the second time he's been caught in a lie and that a controversy has come from it. Last year, he said that there were no "death panels" or government in health care decisions. Representative Joe Wilson blurted out loudly "You lie!" This time, when talking about the Supreme Court a camera caught Justice Samuel Alito shaking his head and mouthing what looked like "That's not true".

Yes, Presidents have disagreed with other Supreme Court decisions, but they've never called that Supreme Court out in the middle of a State of the Union speech.

Obama talked about how both sides of the aisle need to work through their disagreements on various topics and not get on news programs and try to embarass the other side for their positions. Then he looked at the Republicans and said that saying "no" to everything is not bipartisan. Apparently, the definition of bipartisanship to this president is agree with me or you're partisan.

He also seemed to blame the Senate rule of 60 votes to get cloture is the Republicans doing. He said that if Republicans insist on 60 votes to get a bill passed, that the Republicans would now have to engage in the legislating.

Obama did nothing in the speech to lead on bipartisanship. He antagonized. That's it.

4. National Security

In my last post, I said that I'd be surprised if Obama talked about National Security first. But what I didn't expect was that National Security wouldn't even be mentioned other than in passing.

President Bush, in at least one of his speeches, didn't mention National Security until the end. I was surpised he didn't lead off with that because that is the most important job of the President of the United States. However, in that speech, Bush saved National Security for last and he was very straight forward about National Security as he saw it. He was solemn, direct and had a laid out plan that he put out for the American people and plain spoken. He was also humble and serious.

We did not get that from Obama. Even the liberal commentators after the speech said they were surprised at how little was said about National Security. He briefly said something about it when he was talking about bipartisanship when he said to stop saying "you're more patriotic than I".

When he actually spoke about National Security, he blew his own horn saying he had prevented attacks. But then he dropped back into the bash Bush mode yet again when he said that he had killed or captured more terrorists during 2009 than had been captured or killed during 2008.

I will give Obama credit here. I don't know if it's true, but it appears that he has been very aggressive in killing terrorists and the leadership of Al Queda. He's using drones and killing terrorists, especially the leadership. We're constantly hearing how one leader or another is being killed. Did the press just not report it in the past? I don't think so. I believe that Obama has actually led and stepped up the attacks on the terrorist leadership.

Obama did not mention the trials planned for New York soon. He did not mention that the underwear bomber in Detroit was read the Miranda rights after only 50 minutes of questioning which led to the bomber lawyering up and then shutting up.

He also claimed that the War in Iraq is ending. He didn't claim victory. He only said the war was ending and all troops would be home by August. Rather than claiming victory, he then admonished the American people to welcome the troops home. Show the proper respect as they come home. As if to say 'we don't want people spitting on the troops as they did following Vietnam'. This was a very condescending comment to the American people.

He made no comment about the terrorists being tried in Federal courts. He made no mention of the three terrorist attacks in this country since he took over. He made no mention of Fort Hood or Arkansas and only said that they have revamped their procedure since the Christmas attack by the underwear bomber.

President Obama was very condescending to the American people. He was downright snotty to the Supreme Court and anyone that disagreed with him. Has he really misread the results of the elections of the past few months? Or is he trying to change what those results mean?

If one of my children had spoken to me in the manner that Obama spoke to the American people in that State of the Union address, they'd have been grounded for not showing the proper respect.

I'm perfectly happy with Obama being snotty and defiant because it means that come next November, he'll be pretty much impotent when it comes to harming the United States of America with his silly ideas and destructive policies. He didn't like that the Senate rejected the commission he wanted to start so he said he'll do it anyway by Executive order. In other words, if Congress won't give me what I want, I'll take it anyway. Just like a snotty little kid. Or a bully. You choose.

This was 70 minutes long, but it seemed to last much longer. I'm not sure which was more aggravating. Listening to him drone on spending money while talking about freezing spending or talking about bipartisanship while being partisan or watching Joe Biden's head bob up and down all night.

This speech wasn't just embarassing, it was a train wreck.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

State of the Union: It's Bush's fault!!!

Over the weekend, I've been listening to the pundits wondering what the President needs to say in his State of the Union Address. All of their concerns are about his lower standing in the country now which has been reinforced with the Democrat losses in Virginia and New Jersey for their Governors, and the most recent in Massachussetts with the election of Scott Brown to the Senate.

I find it interesting that they are more worried about the President losing the backing of the American people and how to get it back rather than what the Republicans will now insist on now that they have a seat at the table by virtue of their new numbers. But that's a discussion for another time.

The State of the Union is a requirement of the Constitution in Article II Section 3. It is not required to be given in person. In fact, he must be invited to the House to be able to even address the Congress. George Washington gave a state of the union address but Thomas Jefferson decided that it resembled too much the Monarchs giving their addresses, and discontinued it. It was picked up and started again by Woodrow Wilson in 1913.

There are things that I think are pretty certain about this President and this State of the Union. These are very simple things that anyone could predict. It's unlikely that National Security will be the first thing he talks about because he and his administration has screwed up so bad in the three terrorist attacks we've had in the past year since he became President. It is the most important thing that a President is responsible for, but with his weakness on National Security I'll be very surprised if he talks about that first.

Another thing we can be pretty assured of is that he'll blame "the previous adminstration" for all of the country's woes. He'll say at least once that he "inherited" whatever topic he's going to talk about. He'll likely make excuses for some of the things he's done that didn't work or that people disagree with saying that they did the same as the previous administration. For example, he'll likely comment on the terrorists being tried in New York saying that Bush did the same thing with the shoe bomber.

It's also a pretty good bet that Obama will use the term "I" an awful lot in his speech and at some point, after talking about himself will say that it's not about him. Or he may start off saying it's not about him, then spend a tremendous amount of time saying "I", or "me".

I'm sure he'll talk about the evils of Wall St., the evils of the Insurance companies, and the evils of Bankers. Yet, he wants to control Wall St., take over insurance and talk more about his bank tax saying it's wrong for banks to pass those costs on to consumers.

One thing I'm sure he won't do is he won't bow to the American people, nor the Congress as he did in Saudi Arabia, Japan and China. It's also pretty much a given that his speech won't be uplifting and positive about the United States. I just wonder if he'll call America and its' people "arrogant" as he has said to other countries about us in the past.

Then we'll turn on CNN or MSNBC and hear the pundits say how his speech will be a "game changer" and how he pefectly laid the blame of the current problems at the feet of George W. Bush.

Gee, now that I know all of this, I guess I don't have to watch it. Perhaps I could watch reruns of Tom and Jerry instead and get some real mind stimulating television viewing in on Wednesday night.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Obama Devastating America/Kiki Emerges from other Devastation

There are two points to this post. One is what President Obama has done this week and the other is the earthquake in Haiti.

Now that health care reform is dead, Obama has returned to telling Americans how to live. In the past couple of days, he has nationalized the student loans and is now directing where banks may and may not invest their funds as punishment for success.

First he started with trying to put a fee on the banks for paying bonuses on the money they earned last year. Now, I can understand if he wants to complain about banks that still owe money from the bailout program last year, but he didn't limit the fees to just those that owe. It seems to me that it would have been wise for those institutions to pay a bonus for their earnings last year, but the bonuses could have been smaller for the institutions that owe still on the bailout. However, he was wanting to charge all of these institutions for that, even if they didn't receive bailout money.

Someone really needs to sit this man down and explain to him that businesses do not pay the governments fees and taxes. They write the checks, but the money is not paid by them. It's paid by you and me. When the government puts a higher tax or a fee (which really is a tax even if it's called a fee) on a business, the business passes the cost on to the consumer. Higher ATM rates, higher monthly fees for having an account and so on.

In his announcement yesterday about restricting the investments, Obama complained that the institutions were going to pass those fees on to their consumers and said it was the absolutely wrong thing to do. Obama proved to the world that he has no idea how business works. If you go to a store and see a head of lettuce for sale for $1.25, that head of lettuce does not cost the store that much. They must make a profit or they won't be able to pay their bills, pay their employees and operate their business. If the wholesale cost of a head of lettuce is $1.35, you're just not going to see the price at $1.25. Obama seems to think you should.

Obama is acting like the controlling husband or wife. He's the guy that controls every aspect of your day. Tells you when you can talk on the phone, or who you can have as friends, or feeds you a meal that he/she knows you don't like because you wouldn't go out for dinner with them that night or has people watching to make sure that you're living your life as they think you should.

In our everyday lives, most of us know that as abuse. What usually happens when you suffer that abuse? You leave. Obama was told on Tuesday in the election in Massachussetts that the people are leaving him by electing a Conservative Repubican, Scott Brown, to the Senate from a state that is overwhelmingly liberal Democrats.

When Obama started speaking yesterday, the Dow figures were listed in the lower right corner of the television. It was down 173 points. By the time he ended his speech, it was down 227 points.

Obama is like that controlling spouse. He's telling the country to do it his way or else. I'm to the point where I'd like to see the "or else". Can we really be any worse off?

One thing about the American people. If they feel that something is being done wrong in a business, they won't do business with that institution. They don't need an organized boycott or an over-controlling President to punish others for us. The American people are honest and when abuse happens, they will take their business elsewhere, just like they take their lives elsewhere when there is an abusive spouse.

My second comment is about the earthquake in Haiti. I could talk about how the same problems are happening with the rescue efforts in Haiti as happened in New Orleans following Hurricane Katrina with the length of time it's taken to get water and food and medicine to the victims of the earthquake, but something good actually came out of the devastation in Haiti.

As you can see by the picture posted there was a success. A young boy was buried in the rubble for a week and a day. No food, no water. Trapped in the rubble. The boy is seven years old. Rescue workers found him. When they dug away the debris, they reached down to grab the youngster to pull him out. But he was scared. He saw the faces that weren't recognizable to him and didn't want to come out.

Some family members were brought to the opening to speak to him to put him at ease. He finally relented and allowed the rescue workers to help him out. What you can't see in the picture is the scared look on his face as he emerged from the hole. But what you do see is his arms spread wide and the biggest smile on his face when everyone starts cheering at his rescue.

There are many dead from this earthquake and the aftershocks that have been hitting almost on a daily basis. Bodies are lined up in the streets and then hauled off to mass graves and buried. But then, a week and a day after the earthquake a young boy is brought out of the rubble and his biggest fear is that strangers are reaching down to try to help him and he doesn't understand all of the strangers being there. When he's brought up, and sees how everyone is happy to see him, he puts on the biggest smile and spreads his arms out wide. The boys name is Kiki. I don' t know who took the picture, but I suspect we'll all know soon and Kiki will likely be remembered for a long time.

With so many problems, whether those problems are in our personal lives, or health, or political or whatever particular problem may be affecting one person, another person or groups of people, it's good to be reminded that good things also come from bad situations and this picture of this little boy is a perfect example of that.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Massachussetts Massacre: R.I.P. Socialized Medicine

Soon, you can say Senator Scott Brown. The Massachussetts Republican becomes the first Republican to win a Senate seat in 38 years replacing the late Ted Kennedy.

The man who ran claiming to be the 41st vote against the Socialized Health Care Takeover beat out Martha (Marcia, according to Patrick Kennedy) Coakley by more than 100,000 votes in the most liberal state in the country.....well, it used to be.

Senator Jim Webb (D) of Virginia has already come out and said that any vote on health care reform should be delayed until Brown is seated in the Senate.

In the meantime, Democrats are blaming each other for the loss of the Senate seat. Obama is blaming Coakley. Coakley is blaming Obama and the DC Democrats. They are all in a circle shooting at each other tonight.

After a year of quadrupling the deficit and adding $2 Trillion to the debt the people of Massachussetts are the third such voters to tell Obama that he's doing it all wrong. This special election and the two in Virginia and New Jersey, both won by Republicans and even the House seat in New York that was barely won by a Democrat in a three way race where the Conservative party candidate was narrowly defeated are the nations first shots fired at Washington DC that the people of this country don't like what they are doing.

The months leading up to November, should be very interesting.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Irony at it's Best

236 years, one month and three days ago, the people of Boston dressed as Indians and tossed tea into the Boston Harbor. This was one of many protests staged by the citizens of that time in our history protesting against oppressive taxes. For the past fifty years, Massachussets has been a liberal bastion. Even to the point of it being called "Taxachussets."

In the past year, protests have sprung up around the country. They started last February to protest the bailouts, the excessive spending bill called the stimulus and the move towards socialism in less than a month by the new president. They call their protests "Tea Parties". These caught on and on April 15, tea parties were held all over the country. The Democrats held the House, the Senate and the White House and were passing spending bills that were not paid for.

In August, people showed up in droves at Town Hall meetings around the country put on by their Senators and Representatives. Night after night we heard on the news how people who had never been involved in politics before were questioning and calling out there representatives and senators on the proposed health care.

Health care passed the House without one Republican vote. Health care passed the Senate in the dark of night on Christmas eve without one Republican vote. If you believe the polls, more than 60% of the people of this country are against the health care reform bill.

Now the irony. Massachussets, which has its' own government health care plan that is costing a fortune, is holding a special election to replace the late Ted Kennedy. The Republican was behind by over 30 points a month ago. Today, the day of the election, polls are showing that he's up by anywhere from five to ten points. The home of the original Tea Party in 1773, the state that has come to be known as Taxachussets, is now where the bill may finally die.

Not one Democrat, nor the two Independents have backed down despite the will of the people. The White House has not backed down. News reports are all about how they get the health care bill passed if Scott Brown, the Republican, wins today.

There has not been one mention on any news program that this bill may have taken too much and that they should go back and review it and make it more of something that the American people want. In other words, the Republican bill that's been proposed.

Another irony. This is the 365th day of Barack Hussein Obama's presidency. In one year, he has quadrupled the deficit. He has doubled the national debt. We now owe more money than we've ever owed before. We now spend more than we've ever spent before and more than we have.

Republicans have been shut out of the process. The closed door meetings have only included Democrats. They are forcing their will on the American people that do not want their will shoved down their throats.

This election may not solve the problem of the socialist takeover of the health care system. The Democrats are trying to figure out how to pass it even if they don't have the sixty votes needed to pass it. They are going so far as to have the House (which had a much more liberal plan) vote to accept the Senate version just to get the bill passed so that it doesn't have to be voted on in the Senate and thus eliminating the will of the people by electing the 41st Republican which can stop this bill.

The Democrats are perfectly willing to scrap the best health care system in the world in order to take on the flawed systems of Europe and Canada.

In 1773 the Boston Tea Party showed the will of the people, but it was still another two years before the Shot heard round the world in Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775. It was another year before the Declaration of Independence was created making this a new nation.

This election may not solve the problem of eliminating the health care bill that will take away freedom for Americans. However, it should be the catalyst to create a new revolution that will likely start in November with the ousting of Democrats around the country.

The Democrats have shown their hand. They don't want what this country has been about for 234 years. They want to create a new America that is more like Europe. The founding fathers aren't their hero's. They don't look to George Washington, John Adams, Thomas Jefferson, Thomas Paine, Benjamin Franklin. Instead they look to Saul Alinsky. They aren't there to represent the people of this country, they are there to make a name for themselves and to take over every aspect of every citizens lives.

I said before that this election has already been lost by the Democrats even if Martha Coakley wins the special election in Massachussets. Whatever the result of todays election, this should be just a precursor of what's to come in the second revolution in this country. Whatever happens, November will be a very interesting election and it all came to fruition in the most unlikely of places. Massachussets, the home of the original Tea Party.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Democrats Already Lost Massachussets

The Democrats have lost Massachussets even if they end up with the seat. How is this possible? The people of this country are really upset about the spending that this administration with this congress has implemented.

They've spent billions of dollars on a failed stimulus plan. They've spent millions of dollars on the failed "Cash for Clunkers". The House has already passed the Cap and Tax bill which will increase taxes on all Americans for global warming, which has been shown to be a hoax with the E-mails that were exposed a few months ago.

The Democrats and the administration have proven themselve incompetent when it comes to national security. We had one attack less than seven months after President Bush took office and we were not attacked again the rest of his Presidency. Now, in less than one year, we've already had three terrrorist attacks in this country. One in Arkansas, one in Texas and one in Michigan. They have really shown their incompetence with the latest one in Michigan.

Now we have the administration and the Congress (only Democrats, mind you) working on the health care bill. The American people don't want it. The approval rating for the health care bill is at 36% and dropping. Obama said no less than 8 times that this process would be in the public eye on C-Span. It's not happening. Even Brian Lamb got into it. You have to work really hard to get Brian Lamb to take a position.

After Ted Kennedy's death, the state of Massachusetts decided to change the law to keep the seat in the hands of a Democrat. Let me state that again. They changed the current law because they couldn't trust the people to put a Democrat in the seat formerly held by Kennedy.

Now the people of Massachussets are putting the fear of God into the Democrats. For a Republican to get close to election in the Senate is a miracle. Scott Brown, the nominee for the Republicans is now behind by just 2 points to the Democrat, Martha Coakley. There is less than a week before the election. It will be held on Tuesday, January 19.

Even if Brown wins, the Democrats already have a strategy to do their will rather than the will of the people. They plan to not install him into the Senate until after they have their health care bill voted on.

The Democrats have this habit of working in their own best interests rather than working for the people they represent. Their strategy shows it. Their arrogance in this election shows it. The debate showed it. David Gergen asked Scott Brown about being the 41st vote and stopping the health care reform bill. In his question he asked if he would do that sitting in Teddy Kennedy's seat. Brown's answer is one that should have been stated many times in the past. The seat was occupied by Kennedy, but it wasn't Kennedy's seat. It is the people's seat.

For Scott Brown to be as close as he is to winning in Massachussets is nothing short of a miracle. This should be a wake up call for the Democrats. They've dismissed the tea parties and they've ignored the will of the people. They've all but shut off town hall meetings because they were being told that the people were against their massive spending, their increased taxes and their attempts to destroy this country.

I normally don't believe in moral victories, but this is Massachussets. Or Taxachussets as it's better known. The liberal bastion. For a Republican to even be close, let alone this close a week before the election is a moral victory for the Republicans and the country.

Scott Brown raised $1.3 million in 24 hours this week. He has a real shot at winning this seat. The people of Massachussets have Martha Coakley on the run and panicking. Bill Clinton, John Kerry and Barack Obama are all involved in this race now. When the people of Massachussets are rejecting the Democrats, you would think that the Democrats all around the country would be taking stock of their positions. But they are liberals and can't face the idea that they are wrong and change their tactics and actually start working for what's good for the American people and their wishes.

If Brown wins, we just might see some more Democrats decide to "retire" from their "careers" in the House and Senate. This miracle that we've seen take place is the beginning of a new revolution. It's a repudiation of the liberals in this country.

Brown has shown the Republicans that the Conservative message is the right one and the winning one even if he doesn't win. Just being close is a victory. If Coakley wins, the Democrats may still get their health care bill through (although I still have my doubts about that), but they will lose in huge numbers in November.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Terrorism Has Returned to American Soil

On Christmas Day, a plane carrying 278 people to Detroit from Amsterdam had a terrorist incident. On it's approach to Detroit, approximately 20 minutes from Detroit Metro Airport, the homicide bomber fired his weapon.

In November, a month before the Detroit flight, a man in Nigeria reported to the United States Embassy that his son might be plotting a terrorist attack on the United States. The father was the former chairman of the First Bank of Nigeria. Still the son was not put on the no fly list.

When the terrorist was purchasing his ticket for the flight, he was asked how long he intended to stay in Detroit and they were told two weeks. Yet he had no luggage. This is a warning sign for possible terrorism. Yet he wasn't checked further. He also paid for his ticket in cash, another warning sign.

The terrorist had sewn an explosive into his underwear. The same explosive used by the Shoe Bomber. We've all heard the stories of elderly men and women being checked thoroughly before being allowed on a plane, but somehow, a guy with no luggage and who paid cash for his ticket, wasn't given the same scrutiny, or possibly any scrutiny.

As the plane made it's approach to Detroit Metropolitan airport, the terrorist set about igniting his bomb. But something when wrong. Instead of exploding, it popped like a fire-cracker, and ignited his pants. Smoke was seen, then fire. A passenger dived across four seats onto the terrorist and suffered burns himself in trying to subdue the terrorist and put the fire out.

The passengers pinned the terrorist down and they, along with the crew restrained him and moved him to the front of the plane. When the plane landed, authorities took the terrorist into custody. They read him his Miranda rights. He is now facing 20 years in prison. He's since claimed to have been trained by Al-Queda for this mission.

Following the attempted homicide bombing, Homeland Security Secretary, Janet Napolitano claimed that the security measures worked. She later had to back off of that when challenged on that statement.

Quite the contrary. There are many things wrong with this. First, a prominent man in Nigeria gave the warning about his son. Yet the son was not put on a no fly list. There was no security that prevented the terrorist to board the plane. If there was, he'd have not been permittted on the plane.

The only reason this man was stopped was because of some alert and fast acting passengers none of whom were government security people.

The only thing that the government accomplished in this is they allowed a terrorist on the plane then took him into custody, giving him rights he's not entitled to. The passengers are the hero's.

Does this sound familiar? Beginning in 1993 with the first World Trade Center bombing we were attacked at least 8 times ending with the USS Cole in 2000. All of those caught were tried in Federal courts.

On September 11, 2001 we were attacked for the first time under President Bush. Less than a month later, he took the war to Afghanistan. From September 11, 2001 until the end of the Bush Presidency, we were not attacked on our soil again. Yes, there were attempts, but they were all thwarted. Some we know about, some we don't. During those year, liberals have complained about our government listening in on private conversations of Americans. They don't include in their complaints that the calls are made either to this country from another country or from here to another country. They prefer to make it sound like the wiretaps are on Peggy sharing her chocolate chip cookie recipe with Agnes on the other side of town. They don't seem to have the same problem with the Obama administration monitoring twitter and facebook accounts.

We were warned during the campaign of 2008 that Democrats didn't care about National Security. We were warned by Vice-President Elect Joe Biden that Obama would be tested in the six months of his Presidency. He was only off by three months. On November 5, Fort Hood was attacked. Now, less than two months later, a second attack. There were warning signs in each but they were ignored by this administration.

Let me be very clear. These are acts of war. These are not parking violations. These are not breaking and entering crimes. These are not bank robberies. These are acts of war. So what has this administration done in the past year? They'd said they'd close Guantanamo Bay by January 2010. This will fail. They can't get it done by then. They have released detainees back to their home countries and in the case of one group, released them in the tropics. This group may now be serving you your drinks when you're on vacation this winter.

They have passed a stimulus package that has failed miserably. The money has gone to their backers but not back to the people of this country and what has gone out has failed. They have done "cash for Clunkers" which was a bust. They've passed Cap and Trade in the House, then it was discovered that global warming was a hoax when E-mails by the scientists were discovered.

Now they have passed health care despite more than 58% of the people of this country being against it.

However, they have failed miserably at National security. Two attacks in 10 months time and they are going to try these acts of war in criminal court along with the vilest terrorist, Kaleed Sheik Muhammad.

What was their solution to this latest attack? They came out with a directive that you may have nothing on your lap the last hour of your flight. That was rescinded within 24 hours of having issued the directive, which may be the only right thing this administration has done since taking office.

There are some simple solutions to this. When a father tells you his son may be a terrorist plotting an attack on you, don't let him fly into this country. When you have a nutcase in the military, a psychiatrist no less, you don't give him a weapon let alone teach him how to use it.

When a terrorist does happen to work his way through, and you catch him (or more appropriately the citizens of this country do your job for you), you classify him as a prisoner of war and shove him into a 6x6 cage at Gitmo and get as much information from him as you can and then leave him to rot in that cage until the war is over....sometime in the next century.

Terrorists were treated as jaywalkers in the 90's and prosecuted in the courts. Yet we were attacked over and over again. When they were treated as prisoners of war, and we actually went and bombed Afghanistan after the worst attack in our history, and terrorists were put into Gitmo indefinitely, we didn't have any more attacks in the country. Now we have another liberal in the White House that is afraid to deal with war criminals as war criminals we can expect more and more attacks.

We just keep getting more and more examples of the incompetence of this administration and people die from this incompetence. That's not protecting the American people from foreign attack which is their charge. Two attacks. 12 dead. 32 injured. But not one dead terrorist yet. The courts are filling up though.

We've had three attacks in the past 8 years. Three planes crashed and killed people on the ground. Two at the World Trade Center and one at the Pentagon. People on the plane were killed, people in the buildings were killed. One plane crashed that saved either the Congress or the White House when the passengers (citizens) gave their lives to save politicians. One attack where 12 were killed and 31 injured at Ft. Hood. Now another attack that was thwarted by passengers (citizens) and one injured. So far, it appears that the American citizen is saving more lives than the government, who have the power to stop anyone from being hurt with just a tiny bit of due diligence in these latest two incidents.

Terrorism has returned to our soil after seven years. This could be a long (and deadly) three years coming up.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Pimps and Whores Legally Operating in Washington DC

Apparently, the change we can believe in is that we now have blatant examples of Pimps and Whores in Washington.

The whores include, Senator Mary Landrieu of Louisiana, Senator Bernie Sanders of Vermont, and Senator Ben Nelson of Nebraska.

Landrieu received $300 million for Louisiana for her vote on the destruction of Health Care in this country. Sanders received several billion dollars to help Vermont pay for the increase in medicaid for the state of Vermont, and Nelson recieved billions with the guarantee that the state of Nebraska will not have to ever pay the increase costs of medicaid in Nebraska along with the guarantee that abortion will not be funded by tax dollars.

The pimps? Well, they seem to be President Barack Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. There is no truth to the rumor that the Presidential Limousine will now be painted pink and have huge fuzzy dice on the mirror nor the big white wall tires. We'll have to wait and see if they redo the interior with shag carpeting.

This farce put on by the United States Senate can only be called nothing more than the actions of a whorehouse. It's quite a fall for what used to be a revered institution. But it's not over yet. The Republican will likely force a reading of the entire bill before the week is out. However, the Democrats will likely bring in a speed reader to try to offset that reading.

The Democrats want this voted on before Christmas because they do not want to go back to their districts to face the voters prior to a vote. It's likely that most Democrats will not hold open town hall meetings when they do come back.

If this does pass the Senate, the next step will be the House and Senate getting together to hammer out the differences. Abortion and public option could still put this bill in the dumper. The liberals don't want to do without either, the moderates (are there any of those on the Democrat side?) don't want it in.

The good news is that this could change the face of the election in 2010 even more drastically than it already would have. Dick Morris predicted about two weeks ago, that just because of the developments to that point on health care was enough to give the Republicans the majority in both the House and the Senate. If this destruction of the Health Insurance Industry bill passes, we could possibly be looking at the Republicans having an outside chance to not just take back both Houses, but also get a 2/3 majority to override a veto.

The mantra for the Republicans could very well be "Repeal the Destruction of Health Care" and if successful, and they get the 2/3 they need, if they do pass the repeal next year, Obama will veto it and the veto will be overridden. This is admittedly pie in the sky hope, but passage of this bill could bring that pie in the sky to more of a reality.

Naturally, Tea Parties will take place all over the country and while it wouldn't be appropriate to throw Tea into the Boston Harbor to make the point, it might be appropriate to take bandages and stick them to the Capitol Dome. Or perhaps a sign in front of the Capitol that says "Public Brothel". I wonder if they'll now have to decorate the Lincoln Bedroom with lace and garters.

Whatever happens, it will be a very interesting year leading up to the election in November 2010.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Tiger Woods Saga...or Soap Opera

I have just two things to say about the Tiger Woods soap opera currently being played out day to day in Florida.

First, why is the press covering this? They said that consensual sex during the Clinton years was nobody's business. I guess that only applies to certain people based on their position.

The second thing about Tiger Woods is simple. It's between him, his wife and God. So................

I

Don't

Care!!!

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Obama is Moonlighting

I have come to the realization that President Obama is not just the President of the United States. He's moonlighting by having a second job. Let's look at what's going on.

He's bringing terrorists, such as Kalid Sheik Muhammad, to New York to be tried in American Courts at the federal level after proclaiming that justice will be served and he'll be punished. Yet, we have three Navy Seals that recently captured a high value Al Queda target who are being charged with giving this terrorist a fat lip. Their trial will be held in the military. They are being court martialed for giving a well known terrorist a fat lip.

Or maybe we could look at Global Warming. This has been debunked with the recent revelations from a hacked E-mail account that netted thousands of E-mails showing that the scientists were playing fast and loose with the truth. Yet, Obama's EPA decided yesterday to announce that CO2 is harmful and now will be regulated by the EPA. Isn't CO2 what we breathe? Anyway, in addition to the EPA coming out with their decision just days after we find that global warming is a hoax, Obama will be going to Copenhagen for the global warming summit, where they have over 1200 limousines in use and over 140 private planes were used to arrive there.

The final clue (and it may not be final, but it's the last one that I'm putting on here) was a meeting held a couple of days ago. The administration held a meeting on Transparency in Government. Just one problem with that. They held the meeting on open government (transparency) behind CLOSED DOORS! In other words, not open to the public.

So it's plain as the nose on your face that Obama's second job is as a comedy writer for all of the comedians out there. The writers on the Tonight Show, Letterman, and Leno couldn't make this stuff up. Why pay writers when they can just listen to Obama speak and get their material from the asinine things he comes up with?

You're welcome to comment...even in the open.

Brett

Can We Afford Obama?

Have you ever heard of the woman that goes to the store, writes a check and is told there is non sufficient funds to cover the check and she says "I can't be out of money. I still have some checks left." ?

Meet President Obama. Obama has spent $3.52 Trillion in his first year and his year isn't even completed yet. If we adjust that for inflation, he's spent $2.8 Trillion compared to President Bush's $1.8 Trillion and President Clinton's $1.6 Trillion.

Obama's budget has a deficit of $1.4 Trillion. That is just under $1 Trillion more than the previous high during the Bush administration.

But those are just dollars. There are other ways that I don't think we can afford Obama. For instance, National Security. Once again, Amnesty is out there. The American people rose up and shut it down two years ago when Bush, McCain and others proposed a pathway to citizenship for those that had come here illegally. Now, Homeland Security Secretary Janet Napolitano is proposing the same thing all over again. Forgiving those that broker our laws and even rewarding them with citizenship.

Or can we afford to have Obama ponder General McChrystals request for 45,000 troops in Afghanistan. We've been waiting for over 90 days for him to decide. In the meantime, the troops morale has slipped. Deaths of our soldiers have taken a steep climb in recent months. Even Britain, one of our greatest allies is saying that Obama is wishy washy on the war with his indecision.

Now we have a President that is bowing to the King of Saudi Arabia, the Emporer of Japan and the leader of China. There is a cartoon going around showing Obama bowing to the Burger King with an aide telling him that it's not necessary to bow to the Burger King.

The stimulus package was a complete failure. The promise that if the stimulus deal passed, we'd stop the 20,000 job losses each day hasn't happened. That unemployment would stop at 8% (now at 10.2%). Liberals like to say that had it not been for the stimulus the economy would be even worse off. I disbelieve that. I believe that the Free Market System would have boosted the economy more and that the stimulus deal only held back the markets from growing even further.

It's well known that you don't increase taxes in a recession. But that seems to have been lost on Obama. This new health care debacle not only raises taxes next year, but it raises taxes without the American people getting any benefit for their increased dollars sent in for four more years. It's like paying for a car that you can't pick up until it's paid for in four years.

Cash for Clunkers was also a failure. Yes, it helped boost the economy helping to cause a 2.8% growth in the 3rd quarter, but that's a tent that's gone up without a supporting pole. It won't last on that alone. The Cash for Clunkers cost the American taxpayer $24,000 per car.

As with Clinton, Obama ran as a centrist, but as quick as he was handed the keys to the White House, he began governing as a liberal. Or worse. A socialist.

This Thanksgiving, it might be wise for us to give thanks that Obama hasn't already completely destroyed the country. I hope we can give thanks for at least the same thing next year.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Another Election, Another Vote Count Screwup

What is it about people that work for the government and election commisions that they don't know how to count by ones? Have the government schools gotten so bad that counting from 1-10 is now a special skill? Let me see if I can help. To count to ten, it's 1,2,3,4,5,6,7,8,9,10. Once you've got that nailed down, you only need count to ten again, but this time put a one (1) in front of the second count to ten. This is called the teens. Then do it again, to reach 30 and so on. It's really not difficult if you put down the gameboy, x-box and IPod.

What brought this is on is that the New York 23 race may not be over. Apparently, there was a misreporting of numbers and miscounts. The reason has something to do with the phones. You can read the information for yourself at http://www.syracuse.com/news/index.ssf/2009/11/its_not_over_recanvassing_shows_ny23_race.html

There are over 10,000 absentee ballots to count yet. Bill Owens lead dropped from over 5,000 votes to over 3,000 votes. Since the absentee ballots were sent in prior to Dede Scozzafava suspending her campaign, it's thought that the absentee ballots would go in favor of Doug Hoffman, the Conservative candidate.

Should the count from the absentee ballots overcome the deficit for Hoffman, Bill Owens would have to be removed. Speaker Pelosi swore in Owens before the election was certified to get a needed vote on the Health Care bill passed last Saturday. His vote for the Health Care bill was the opposite of what he'd campaigned on.

It's a slim chance for Hoffman to win, but with how these vote counts have gone in recent years, nothing would surprise me.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Terrorism! It's baaaaaccck.

We all knew it would happen. Terrorism has returned to our shores after an 8 year hiatus.

We were attacked in 1993 roughly a month after Bill Clinton took office with the bombing of the World Trade Center. There were a total of eight attacks during Clinton's eight years in office. More if you believe that Flight 800 was also a terrorist attack. Clinton treated it like a criminal act rather than an act of war.

Less than eight months after President Bush took office, we were attacked. The World Trade Center, the Pentagon and the plane that crashed in Pennsylvania due to some very brave passengers who saved either the White House or the Capitol, on September 11, 2001. Bush reactetd quickly and began the bombing of Afghanistan on October 7, 2001. We were not attacked even once for the remainder of Bush's years. They tried, but Bush and Cheney were on top of it.

Now here we are, just over nine months into Obama's Presidency and we're attacked again. This time from within. What's even worse is that it's from within our own military. What will Obama do?

The prospects of him doing anything significant are not encouraging. It's been 90 days since General McChrystal told the President he needs 40,000 more troops in Afghanistan. This is the war that Obama said was important. Yet, here we are 3 months after the request for troops was made and Obama still can't make up his mind about what to do.

The initial reports were that the shooter at Fort Hood, in Texas was shot and killed. This after he had killed and wounded over 40 people. Then we found out that he wasn't dead. The next reports were that he wanted out of his planned deployment to Afghanistan. He didn't want to go and fight. An odd position for a soldier to take. Of course nobody wants to go to war, but that's what the military is for when we're at war.

Then it started coming out that he was Muslim and was upset about being teased. He had been saying he was against the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. So why did he stay in the military? If he's against the fighting, whether it's against countries in the middle east or any other country, if you can't go to fight for your country when told to go, why are you in the military? If you're so against killing and shooting others, why is the answer to shoot and kill 13 people on a military base? Why wound with a gun another 30 people?

It just doesn't fly that he was against war when he uses a gun to shoot his comrades and others on a military base. The choice he made gets him one of three things. Either he's killed by his own hand or by others during his killing spree, he's caught before he dies and then executed for his actions or he's caught and shipped off to a maximum security prison where nobody will hear from him again. A better option for him would have been to go AWOL or to resign.

He didn't like the wars prior to being ordered to the middle east but those that have spoken to him thought that these wars might come to an end with the election of Obama. When it became apparent that Obama was not going to pull out of Afghanistan anytime soon, he became more upset.

Now we find out that he's been in contact with a radical Imam with Al Queda for nearly a year. E-mails he was sending to Yemen have been intercepted. He was identified and the FBI apparently didn't take it seriously. What more will we learn?

Who knows, but with the information coming out, it's obvious that this was a terrorist attack. This man, who by all accounts was a poor pyshiatrist at best, killed and wounded over 40 people on a military base. This should not have happened. The intelligence community apparently dropped the ball. Those on the base didn't take his words seriously. How many people did he treat that came back from the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan? What's their condition?

More importantly, how will Obama handle this? Will he throw a couple of extra bombs at Afghanistan? Will he turn it over the courts? Now is Obama's chance to prove his worth. We'll now find out if his concern is the safety of America.

I keep remembering what Usama bin Laden said at the start of the war. He said that Americans don't have the stomach for war. This should be a wake up call to Obama. He should be giving McChrystal his 40,000 troops as requested and then after granting them ask the General, "is this enough or would you like more?"

I'm afraid we're about to find out what Obama is made of and that we won't like it. I'll be happy to see him as a one term President, but he still has three years left in that term. That's a lot of time to do alot of damage. Need proof? Look at the deficit. Look at the debt. Look at the taxes we're being saddled with.

What's annoying beyond that is this morning on a radio program, I heard people calling up blaming Bush for this attack. I heard another claim that children shooting up schools weren't terrorists and for the most part, they are white kids shooting up the schools so we shouldn't lable this guy a terrorist. This one really ticked me off because it was nothing more than a repeat of what Van Johnson said in speeches.

We've now got not just terrorists, but a racial divide as well. Now is the time for a leader to step up and put an end to it and label the terrorists for what they are. Terrorists. Unfortunately, the one that's been elected as a leader is not likely to do that.

Vice President Biden said early on to a group of supporters that Obama would be tested within the first year. The test has now been made. If he fails, and it appears it will since it's been four days and he's said little, we could be in for three more years of these attacks.

You're welcome to comment.

Brett

Did the Elections slap down Obama?

Was the Election of November 3, 2009 a repudiation of President Barack Hussein Obama? Yes and no. It is pretty much a standard occurance for off year elections to go against the party in power and against the President, who isn't on the ballot. Only twice has it not happened that way. Those two were Franklin Roosevelt and George W. Bush. However, there were some extenuating circumstances in this election held this year.

The New York 23 race: A Democrat, Owens was running against Skozahfava (I have no idea if the spelling is correct). They were joined by a third party. Hoffman from the Conservative Party. A Democrat had not held that seat since 1850's. So Owens was pretty much a token candidate placed by the Democrats. The Republican, Dede Skozahfava, was even more liberal than Owens who is considered a moderate Democrat. A month ago, people started finding out about Doug Hoffman. Across the country we learned that the Republican was nominated by a group of eleven in the party in upstate New York, which is the district represented by this seat. The people didn't choose Skozahfava, a group of eleven chose her in one of the old classic smoke filled rooms. There was no primary in New York.

Doug Hoffman joined the Conservative party. A new third party begun as a response to the Republicans who, as we know, started spending as much as Democrats always have that cost them the House and Senate in 2006. Hoffman was unknown until a month before the election.

Hoffman received the endorsement of Sarah Palin, Fred Thompson, and others. On the weekend prior to the election, Skozahfava saw the writing on the wall and dropped out of the race. She then threw her support to the Democrat, Owens. Owens eked out a victory from Hoffman. Owens appeared on the ballot twice. Skozahfava was on the ballot twice. She received 5% of the vote. Hoffman appeared on the ballot once.

Next year, this seat is again up for election. I believe Hoffman will run again next year and I believe he'll beat Owens in the election next November.

The New York election can't be attributed to Obama based on all of that information above.

New Jersey is a different story. John Corzine the Democrat incumbent Governor lost to Chris Christie the Republican. Obama appeared at 5 events for Corzine. New Jersey is a decidedly liberal state. They have the highest property taxes in the nation. Corzine has made a bad situation worse in New Jersey. He spent a tremendous amount of money. 3-1 over Christie. Yet Christie beat Corzine. This can be attributed to the poor governing by Corzine as well as the policies of the Obama administration.

Virginia is an impressive state. Both in it's appearance and its' attitudes. Bob McDonnell the Republican against Creigh Deeds the Democrat. I believe this is also a combination of the natural off year elections as well as a repudiation of Obama. The reason for that is the size of the blow out by McDonnell over Deeds. Had McDonnell won by 5 or 6 points, it would be normal, but a 19 point embarrassment must include the Obama factor especially since northern Virginia, a Democrat area, went so strongly for McDonnell.

In Michigan we had our own little election that was a blowout for the Republicans. In the 19th destrict, which is southern middle Michigan there was a special election created when the Senator from that district, Mark Schauer, won the U.S. House seat for the area.

This election had it's own little soap opera to go with it. The seat was vacated after the November 2008 election. Governor Jennifer Granholm decided to leave the seat vacant by not holding a special election sooner and allowing it to remain vacant for nearly a full year. The people of that area were not represented in the State Senate during that time. Mike Nofs (R), a former Representative in the State House ran against Martin Griffin (D), former Mayor of Jackson, Michigan.

In the past year, the former Senator, Schauer, who vacated the seat, was the only one that claimed to have read the stimulus bill back in February when everyone on the planet knew that nobody had read it. He was also given the largest fine for campaign finance violations in state history. In August when the Town Hall meetings were being held and making news, Schauer refused to subject himself to that and didn't hold any open town hall meetings on taxes and health care.

Michigan is already saddled with the distinction of having been in a one state recession for over five years while the rest of the country didn't fall into a recession until a year ago as well as having the highest unemployment rate in the nation for forty months. In addition, the Democrats, led by Governor Granholm raised taxes two years ago and said that we'd not have to raise taxes again, have been trying to raise taxes again this year, and failed to get their budget deal done by the September 30 deadline and passed a continuing resolution for another month where they have fought between deep cuts in spending and raising taxes. The Republicans have prevailed thus far and taxes were not raised, although they likely will be soon.

Noffs beat Griffin by double digits in the special election. This was a combination of tax and spend Granholm, Obama's spending money and the activities of Mark Schauer.

Lastly, there was also and underlying message to Republicans. The message seems to be that the Republicans have an edge due to the Democrats tax and spend, not to mention printing money like it was printing newspapers, but that edge comes with a jaundiced eye. Republicans are trusted more than Democrats, but not by much.

This is a center right country. Conservatives number in the 40% range where liberals are in the 20% range. But Republicans are being watched by people and if they turn out to be Democrat lite, they too are in danger of losing the seats they hold.

So was this election a repudiation of Obama? Yes, but not the entire reasoning behind the results of yesterdays election. Virginia could make the case that it was as Republicans swept the board there.

The fun now begins. Will the Democrats see the writing on the wall and still try to push through this takeover of the health care in this country? Will they still push to get this through and cause tax increases on every person breaking Obama's promise of not one dime of more taxes if you make less than $250,000? I guess the real question would be, are the Democrats that arrogant?

You're welcome to comment.

Brett