ABC News’ Matthew Jaffe reports: President Obama, like any other President, has his fair share of critics. Even fourth-graders have noticed.

“Why do people hate you?”, a fourth-grade boy asked Obama at a town hall event in New Orleans today. “They’re supposed to love you. And God is love.”

“That’s what I’m talking about,” replied the President.

Here’s the video of the exchange, though the transcript is below if you’d prefer:

Um, what the hell was he talking about BEFORE the little boy asked his question? Wasn’t he saying, “It’s a man’s turn. Isn’t it? It’s a guy’s turn.” That’s what it sounded like to me, anyway…So, just what came BEFORE that?? Curious.

Obama continued his response to the child:

“First of all, I did get elected president, so not everybody hates me,” Obama noted, before adding, “What is true is if you were watching TV lately, it seems like everybody’s just getting mad all the time. And I — you know, I think that you’ve got to take it with a grain of salt. Some of it is just what’s called politics where, you know, once one party wins, then the other party kind of gets — feels like it needs to poke you a little bit to keep you on your toes.”

“And so you shouldn’t take it too seriously,” Obama told the boy. “And then, sometimes, as I said before, people just — I think they’re worried about their own lives. A lot of people are losing their jobs right now. A lot of people are losing their health care or they’ve lost their homes to foreclosure, and they’re feeling frustrated. And when you’re president of the United States, you know, you’ve got to deal with all of that.”

So, um, not to quibble or anything, but just when do you think you are going to get around to dealing with job loss, home loss, and losing health care? Hey, just asking:

“You get some of the credit when things go good. And when things are going tough, then, you know, you’re going to get some of the blame, and that’s part of the job,” he continued. “But, you know, I’m a pretty tough guy.”

“You’ve just got to keep on going, even when folks are criticizing you, because — as long as you know that you’re doing it for other people, all right?” Obama concluded.

The boy’s question was the last one the President fielded at his event at the University of New Orleans, his first trip to the city since being elected to the Oval Office.

Well, there is a good reason the child asked that question. While Obama did get elected, the latest Fox Poll shows that he wouldn’t if the election was held today, as this article highlights, Fox News Poll: 43 Percent Would Vote To Re-Elect President Obama:If the election were held today, 43 percent of American voters would back Barack Obama for president, according to a new Fox News poll.

Oh dear. I guess that’s some of the “blame” Obama is getting for not fulfilling his campaign promises, for starters, not to mention his continued constant campaigning instead of working thing he’s got going on. Here are the results of this poll:

In what may be the ultimate job rating, 43 percent of voters say that they would vote to re-elect President Obama if the 2012 election were held today, down from 52 percent six months ago, from April 22-23, 2009.

Obama’s job approval rating comes in at 49 percent this week. (Emphasis mine.) That’s down just one percentage point from late September, but it marks a new low approval for the president — and the first time the Fox News poll has measured his approval below 50 percent.

Moreover, the number of Americans saying they would vote to re-elect President Obama has dropped. If the election were held today the poll finds more voters say they would back someone else in the 2012 election than would back the president.

Despite winning the Nobel Peace Prize last Friday, the latest Fox News poll finds the president’s ratings on foreign issues are lower than his overall job ratings. All in all, 49 percent of Americans say they approve of the job President Obama is doing and 45 percent disapprove. His average approval for the term so far is 58 percent.

Yep, Obama’s approval numbers are below 50% for the first time at 49%. How about on some of the issues:

On Afghanistan, 41 percent of Americans say they approve of the job Obama is doing and 43 percent disapprove. For his handling of Iran, 44 percent approve and 43 percent disapprove.

On the president’s handling of the economy, voters are almost equally split: 48 percent approve and 49 percent disapprove. On health care, some 42 percent approve of the president’s performance and half disapprove, 50 percent.

Among Democrats, 78 percent say they would vote to re-elect President Obama, down from 87 percent in April. For 2008 Obama voters, 81 percent say they would vote to re-elect him — that’s a slight up tick from the 79 percent who said so previously.

Six in 10 Americans — 60 percent — think Obama is a strong and decisive leader.
And while 38 percent think President Obama is getting good advice from his advisors, a larger number — 45 percent — think he is “listening to the wrong people.” (Opinion Dynamics Corp. conducted the national telephone poll of 900 registered voters for FOX News from October 13 to October 14. The poll has a 3-point error margin.)

Like Rahm Emmanuel, or David Axelrod, or Nancy Pelosi, or Harry Reid? Yeah, I’d say he’s listening to the wrong people.

And about that whole Nobel Peace Prize thing:

Did He Deserve It?

Upon winning the Nobel Peace Prize, Barack Obama said, “To be honest, I do not feel that I deserve to be in the company of so many transformational figures.” Most Americans agree with the president — 65 percent say he did not deserve to win, while 29 percent say he did.

Furthermore, a slim 54 percent majority of Democrats think Obama did deserve to win, while 38 percent disagree. For independents, 19 percent think he deserved it, while nearly three-quarters, 74 percent, say he did not. Among Republicans, almost all — 91 percent — say he did not deserve it.

When asked why the Nobel Committee gave the president the prize, about a third of Americans, 32 percent, say because he deserved it, while the largest number — 44 percent — think the committee hoped the prize would make Obama “think twice before using military force in the future.”

About that whole Nobel Peace Prize thing. Remember how we were all told the Committee Was unanimous in their decision to give it to Obama? Turns out that 3 out of 5 of them did NOT want to give it to him. Golly gee, I guess truth really DOES will out! Evidently, their reaction was the same as many of ours – he hasn’t DONE anything yet but speechify, for cryin’ out loud!

The poll also address how Congress was doing:

Most Americans are unhappy with Congress these days — 66 percent disapprove, including 45 percent of Democrats, 77 percent of independents and 84 percent of Republicans. Overall, less than one of four Americans, 24 percent, approve of the job Congress is doing.

Looking ahead to the 2010 Congressional election, for the first time this year the Republicans have the advantage: 42 percent of voters say they are more likely to back the Republicans to provide a check on President Obama’s power, while 38 percent say they would vote for the Democrat to help the president pass his policies.

Finally, in a rare example of bipartisan agreement, majorities of Democrats, 53 percent, Republicans, 78 percent, and Independents, 61 percent, agree the country is more divided these days. All in all, 64 percent of Americans think the country is more politically divided today — that’s more than twice the number who say it is not more divided, 31 percent.

Click here for the raw data.

What a bang-up job Obama has done in uniting us, just like he said he would. Blech. Can’t believe people fell for THAT line again, can you? Great – so glad there is one area that is truly bipartisan. Ahem.

And while President Obama is still feeling the love, the numbers of those who love him seem to be decreasing the more they open their eyes to see and their ears to hear. Such a shame they couldn’t muster that BEFORE the election, isn’t it? Now, his daily tracking poll continues to go down; Secretary Clinton’s approval numbers are higher than his (no big surprise to ME there); and his overall rating is at 49%. COngress doesn’t fare much better. Oh, how the mighty have fallen. Couldn’t have happened to a more deserving guy, or more deserving Congress, could it?

Recently, I reported that Rep. John Conyers had decided to investigate ACORN – again – after all of the recent revelations into their practices (not that many of us weren’t already aware of the numerous “issues” with ACORN). Well, it turns out that his Senate colleague, Senator Harry Reid, the Senate Majority Leader, refuses to do likewise. That’s right, according to this article in his local Las Vegas Paper, he has good reason: EDITORIAL: Reid Blocks ACORN Probe: Tracking abuse by political allies could be ‘distracting’. That’s right – it would be too distracting.

Are you freaking KIDDING me with that BS excuse?? Well, the Editorial staff of the Las Vegas Review Journal couldn’t believe it, either:

ACORN — the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now — is stinking up Washington.

And this is far more significant than if a suspiciously large number of operatives for a purely “private” outfit had been found systematically bending and breaking the law, because ACORN receives and spends taxpayer money — lots of it — and had carried the imprimatur of official partnerships with the IRS, the Census Bureau … the kind of “cred” that in the political world comes only from “who you know.”

Yes, ACORN has friends in high places — friends who are still stonewalling attempts to trace where all that tax money went … perhaps because they know who still has cookie crumbs all over their hands.

It didn’t start with those undercover videos made by a couple of independent filmmakers posing as a prostitute and her pimp, visiting various ACORN offices around the country and getting helpful advice on how to hide their income and “qualify” for a tax-subsidized mortgage to set up a house of ill repute, declaring three of their dozen (albeit imaginary) underage illegal immigrant prostitutes as “dependents.”

That was just a final shoe dropping loudly enough that the problem could no longer be ignored.

One would think, But apparently, it isn’t enough for Senate Majority Leader Reid, despite what happened in his own STATE:

Here in Clark County, Registrar of Voters Larry Lomax said last year he saw “rampant fraud in the 2,000 to 3,000 registrations ACORN turns in every week,” with some 48 percent of those forms being “clearly fraudulent.”

The Las Vegas headquarters of ACORN, “a Democrat-allied organization,” was raided after being “accused of submitting multiple voter registrations with duplicate and false names,” the Washington Times reported last fall. The outfit claimed it had registered to vote in Nevada, among others, the starting lineup of the Dallas Cowboys.

The raid “set off a skirmish over efforts to expand the electorate on behalf of Sen. Barack Obama,” the Times reported.

Mr. Lomax noted ACORN had hired 59 inmates from a work-release program at a nearby prison and that some inmates who had been convicted of identity theft had been made supervisors. “That led some local wags to joke that at least ACORN was hiring specialists to do their work,” reported John Fund at The Politico, last November.

ACORN’s 2008 Las Vegas field director, Christopher Edwards, pleased guilty last spring to two gross misdemeanor counts of conspiracy to commit compensation for registration of voters, in a deal that saw him agree to testify against fellow defendants.

So, tell me again just how it was that ACORN was going to receive BILLIONS of our dollars? This is just ONE county in one city, never mind the other states in which ACORN was conducting fraudulent voter registrations:

Fox News’ Eric Shawn reported there were at least 11 investigations across the country involving thousands of potentially fraudulent ACORN forms. Yet none of this was sufficient to block President Obama and his congressional minions from upping federal subsidies to outfits such as Mr. Obama’s former associates at ACORN from the mere millions to the billions of dollars in their “economic stimulus” bill last winter.

Only when presented with the undeniable evidence of the “pimp and ho” videotape did the IRS last week announce it would terminate ACORN’s participation in the agency’s Volunteer Income Tax Assistance program — shortly after the Census Bureau advised ACORN it could forget about helping with its decennial head count.

Smoke? Fire? Washington Democratic leaders have opted to just lay low and not smell nothin’.

Despite all this evidence and a request in writing by 28 GOP senators — and despite the fact the U.S. Senate voted 83-7 on Sept. 14 to block ACORN from bidding for any more federal grant money — “Senate Democrat Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., is refusing to hold a Senate hearing on ACORN’s activities,” the National Republican Senatorial Committee complained Wednesday.

Mr. Reid replied additional investigations might distract lawmakers from addressing more important matters, including health care and economic recovery.

I see – he’s taking the President Obama tack of not really acknowledging the rampant fraudulent, potentially CRIMINAL, behavior of ACORN by claiming there are bigger fish to fry. I don’t know about YOU, but I kinda think $8.5 BILLION is a lot of fish:

“It’s become increasingly clear that ACORN may have manipulated tens of thousands of ballots in last year’s federal election — an area where Congress has clear oversight responsibilities — yet Harry Reid won’t lift a finger,” said NRSC spokesman Brian Walsh. “It’s hard to see his latest roadblock as anything but another example of Harry Reid protecting his liberal allies in Washington while remaining out of touch with his constituents in Nevada.”

That’s a politically motivated shot, of course. Stripped of the gratuitous elbowing, however, the question does remain: Do Sen. Reid and congressional Democrats really believe that if they just ignore the big mess their pet bear has dumped in the middle of the room, it’ll somehow stop stinking?

Senator Harry Reid is up for re-election this coming year. If the people needed to know for sure if Harry Reid stood with them, or with a highly questionable, highly partisan organization receiving their tax dollars, and perpetrating fraud in their state, they need look no further. Yes, Harry Reid has finally grown a backbone, not to stand up for his constituents, or the American people, or even the Constitution, but rather a corrupt organization that has worked diligently to throw elections.

Wow, what a stand up guy he has turned out to be, huh?

And again, the top cars being purchased are FOREIGN – Toyotas and Hondas are the ones being bought the most, with Ford Focus thrown in there. Just to be clear. (Toyota and Honda are non-unionized, just in case you are keeping score.)

NY state dealers have had it with the program:

Hundreds of auto dealers in the New York area have withdrawn from the government’s Cash for Clunkers program, citing delays in getting reimbursed by the government, a dealership group said Wednesday.

The Greater New York Automobile Dealers Association, which represents dealerships in the New York metro area, said about half its 425 members have left the program because they cannot afford to offer more rebates. They’re also worried about getting repaid…

“(The government) needs to move the system forward and they need to start paying these dealers,” said Mark Schienberg, the group’s president. “This is a cash-dependent business.”

You betcha it is. Check out just how quickly the dealers are getting reimbursed for their cash outlay:

The program offers up to $4,500 to shoppers who trade in vehicles getting 18 mpg or less for a more fuel-efficient car or truck. Dealers pay the rebates out of pocket, then must wait to be reimbursed by the government. But administrative snags and heavy paperwork have created a backlog of unpaid claims.

Schienberg said the group’s dealers have been repaid for only about 2 percent of the clunkers deals they’ve made so far.

Many dealers have said they are worried they won’t get repaid at all, while others have waited so long to get reimbursed they don’t have the cash to fund any more rebates, Schienberg said.

“The program is a great program in the sense that it’s creating a lot of floor traffic that a lot of dealers haven’t seen in a long time,” he said.

“But it’s in the hands of this enormous bureaucracy and regulatory agency,” he added. “If they don’t get out of their own way, this program is going to be a huge failure.”

“If they don’t get out of their own way…”Wow. That’s a pretty telling comment right there, isn’t it? And that sounds SO like the Federal Government, too, doesn’t it Uh, yeah, sure:

The program is administered by the Department of Transportation. Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said Wednesday that dealers will be repaid for the clunkers deals they have completed.

“I know dealers are frustrated. They’re going to get their money,” LaHood told reporters. He said the Obama administration would soon announce how much longer the $3 billion car incentive program will last.

Through early Wednesday, auto dealers have made clunkers deals worth $1.81 billion, resulting in 435,102 new car sales, according to the DOT.

This begs the obvious question: if the Federal Government is incapable of reimbursing these automobile dealers for less than half a million cars, how in the HELL do they think they are going to be capable of running health care for millions and millions of people? That is to say, their track record just isn’t great in this area.

And that is what makes the current threat by Harry Reid to use the “Nuclear Option” to push through what the Wall Street Journal says is “the most expensive part of the plan.”

Oh – and the “Nuclear Option,” in case you don’t know, is a simple majority. Not a veto-proof one, a simple one of 51 – 49.

And they WONDER why so many people are hesitant to have the Feds control our health care? Really?? Wow – kinda makes you wonder about them making decisions for us about, well, EVERYTHING, doesn’t it? Holy smokes…

As some of you know, my mother suffered a stroke recently. I am currently in my home town spending time with her and getting her house in order. As a result, I rushed a recent post on “DADT” I wrote in order to get to the nursing center in a timely fashion. Alert No Quarter reader, Ed, gently (I am not being snarky here – he really was) pointed out to me that the soldier whose actual case went before the Supreme Court was not at ALL amused at Obama’s lack of support, though the rest of my post stands as is, I think. The point is, he is dong nothing, and too many people are allowing him to WORM (What Obama Really Meant) out.

The soldier whose case was thrown out by the SCOTUS, had something to say about it, alright, and it was not a whole bunch of WORMing, as this article makes clear,

Dismay Over Obama’s ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell’ Turnabout. Check this out:

When Barack Obama sought the presidency, he pledged to reverse the “Don’t ask, don’t tell” policy preventing gays and lesbians from serving openly in the U.S. military. Yet on Monday, the Supreme Court rejected a gay Ohio soldier’s challenge to the law — with the legal backing of none other than the Obama Administration.

James Pietrangelo II, the former Army infantryman and lawyer whose case the high court declined to review, reserved most of his ire for President Obama instead of the court. “He’s a coward, a bigot and a pathological liar,” Pietrangelo said in an interview with TIME shortly after the high court declined to hear his appeal. “This is a guy who spent more time picking out his dog, Bo, and playing with him on the White House lawn than he has working for equality for gay people,” he added. “If there were millions of black people as second-class citizens, or millions of Jews or Irish, he would have acted immediately” (emphasis mine) upon taking office to begin working to lift “Don’t ask, don’t tell.” Pietrangelo fought in Iraq in 1991 as an infantryman, and returned as a JAG officer for the second Iraq War, before being booted out in 2004 for declaring he was gay as he was readying for a third combat tour. He was representing himself before the high court.

I don’t want to overreach or anything, but it does sound like Pietrangelo is a tad hot under the collar, as he SHOULD be. About damn time the MSM bothered to report that not everyone is in love with Obama.

As for “DADT” and Obama’s lack of action:

The Obama Administration, in its brief in the case last month, said a lower court acted properly in upholding the gay ban. “Applying the strong deference traditionally afforded to the Legislative and Executive Branches in the area of military affairs, the court of appeals properly upheld the statute,” argued Elena Kagan, who as Solicitor General represents the Administration before the Supreme Court. The bar on gays serving openly is “rationally related to the government’s legitimate interest in military discipline and cohesion,” her 12-page filing added.

The endorsement of “Don’t ask, don’t tell” by the Administration marks the latest rightward tack by Obama. The President denounced many of George W. Bush’s national-security policies during the campaign, but in office has adopted more conservative positions, including endorsing military commissions to try purported terrorists, and declining to release a second batch of photographs depicting alleged U.S. maltreatment of Iraqi detainees. His stance on “Don’t ask, don’t tell” may be more surprising, because Obama aides have made clear the President wants the ban lifted eventually.

“EVENTUALLY”??? Just how the hell long is THAT?? I’m not buying what he’s selling, and neither is Pietrangelo:

Pietrangelo doesn’t buy the line from Obama aides — and the Pentagon — that they’re too busy grappling with a faltering economy and two wars to handle the gay ban right away. “It’s a complete lie that he has too much stuff on his plate — this is the guy who criticized Bush for not being able to multitask,” Pietrangelo says. “We have an old saying in the military — the maximum effective range of an excuse is zero meters.” (Emphasis mine.)

Pietrangelo and others argue that Obama has leeway under the law that codified “Don’t ask, don’t tell” after the 1993 outcry when Bill Clinton tried to allow gays and lesbians to serve openly. The President, they say, could instruct the Secretary of Defense, who has the sole power to carry out the law, to make investigations a rarity, so that “Don’t ask, don’t tell” simply does not function. Indeed, Obama could tell the Pentagon that, as a general matter, it is not in the best interest of the armed forces to expel a service member solely for saying he or she is gay or bisexual.

But the trouble is that the law was passed by Congress and, if Obama decided to go around the legislature, he would face political blowback. The current law allows gays to serve, so long as they keep their sexual orientation secret. The legislation means that a majority of the 535 members of Congress is going to have to vote to undo the ban — and that will have its political fallout. Obama is plainly taking his cue from the 1993 fiasco, which hurt Clinton’s relationship with conservative members of Congress, both Democratic and Republican, and with many in uniform.

But Obama also has some ammunition that Clinton never had: a new Gallup poll finds that most conservatives — 58% — now support openly gay people serving in uniform (nationally, 69% support the change; when Clinton assumed office, a Gallup poll found 53% of those polled opposed lifting the ban). Perhaps even more surprising, 58% of self-described Republicans, and 60% of weekly churchgoers, also support gay men and women serving openly in uniform. “While the Administration to date has not taken action on the issue,” the polling firm reported last Friday, “the Gallup Poll data indicate that the public-opinion environment favors such a move.”

Here’s what gripes me about this, and the other service members who have been kicked out of the military for being LGBT, including Arabic linguists, whom we could actually use right now: the military has actually lowered its enlistment standards over the past few years because of the two wars we are fighting. I am not kidding. Click HERE to read more about it. Doesn’t that just gripe you, too?

Uh, yeah, so enough with the excuses already about “DADT.” Like I said, if Obama has the time to do a videotaped message for Stephen Colbert, giving a “lawful order,” he sure can pick up the phone to call Pelosi and Reid, and tell them to push this through. Dadgummit!

And here’s another good one, courtesy of faithful reader, SF Indie, who informed me of THIS new pick by Obama,
Head Of Pro-Life* Group Gets Job At HHS (* I take issue with the term “Pro-Life, and prefer “Anti-Choice.”). Well I’ll be darned – he’s throwing NARAL, NOW, and a whole bunch of other women and women’s groups under the bus, too???? Oh, I am so, so, so surprised!!! Not, not, not:

The Obama administration has picked the former head of a pro-life Catholic organization to run faith-based and community outreach programs at the Department of Health and Human Services.

Alexia Kelley, co-founder of the liberal group Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good, was appointed Thursday to run HHS’s Center for Faith-based and Community Initiatives. (The administration wouldn’t immediately confirm that, but the Catholic Reporter published a press release from Catholics in Alliance trumpeting the announcement.) Catholics in Alliance’s main goal since Kelley helped found it in 2005 has been to emphasize the Catholic Church’s social justice teachings in the political sphere; like other progressive religious groups, it lines up with Democratic positions on health care, poverty, labor and other issues.

On abortion, the group has mostly worked to find ways to reduce demand, rather than to push laws aimed at curtailing the availability of the procedure. But its Web site makes clear that it isn’t pro-choice. “Catholics in Alliance believes in the sanctity of all human life — from conception until natural death,” says a frequently asked questions page.

Pro-choice activists weren’t happy: HHS oversees health care, including abortion policy, for much of the federal government. Jon O’Brien, president of Catholics for Choice, called it “a defeat for reason and logic.” “The administration has talked a lot about reducing the need for abortion, and progressive groups like my own are totally with the administration in doing that,” he told Salon. But “to have someone working in HHS who oversaw an organization that is anti-abortion… really beggars belief.” The timing of the appointment — just days after abortion provider George Tiller was murdered in his Wichita, Kan., church — is likely to aggravate pro-choice groups even more. (Anti-choice organizations, though, have criticized Catholics in Alliance for giving cover to pro-choice Democrats, by attempting to shift the debate from banning abortion to simply reducing it.)

Well, golly gee – they aren’t happy with the man they chose to support over the WOMAN who has shown her resolve on this issue time and time again?? As Kathy Griffin would say, they can suck it. Again, had they BOTHERED to look at his record (or lack thereof) or his experience (or lack thereof) rather than jumping on the popularity bandwagon, they wouldn’t be so unhappy now. They brought it on themselves BY themselves.

Oh, and you’ll like this part:

Aides at the White House and HHS didn’t immediately return calls and e-mails for comment.

ROTFMLAO – really? They White House and HHS didn’t want to talk about this?? Yeah, I bet.

One last piece:

Update: A spokeswoman for Catholics in Alliance, Jennifer Goff, just sent over a statement. The group clearly wasn’t happy with the criticism from Catholics for Choice: “Catholics in Alliance for the Common Good is working toward reaching common ground in order to make real progress on the moral and political challenges our country faces instead of resorting to spurious attacks launched by those who are more concerned with inflaming the culture wars than effecting positive change.”

Okey dokey. Sure. Whatever they say…

By now, I am certain everyone has heard of the tragedy at the Holocaust Museum. It was a tragedy indeed, and my heart goes out to the security guard’s family, as well to those who were present at the time. But. And you knew it was coming. When President Obama comes out with a statement tout suite on the security guard’s death, and even Fox News talking about honoring this guard’s service, it makes me a bit irritated. And if you have been reading my posts of late, you know why: because Obama waited DAYS to say anything about the soldiers being gunned down in the street outside a recruiting center, men who were not just doing a job, but giving their LIVES in service to this country (and I meant that in the big picture sense – when you are in the military, it ISN’T just a job. It is your LIFE.). Bottom line is this: Private Long deserved at least as much attention as the security guard did, not to in any way, shape, or form diminish the tragic, senseless loss of life at a museum dedicated to memorializing one of the most horrific periods in world history (and it is an amazing, amazing place).

I’m just saying enough WORMing on Obama’s lack of support to our military, for those lost through an unequal law, or through a politically, religiously motivated attack on service members on our own soil. And, enough WORMing on the poor choices Obama continues to make. Enough already.

Again, big thanks to Ed and SFIndie…

Valerie Larabee, a ten-year veteran of the Air Force who retired in 1995 is proud of her service and now runs the Utah Pride Center. The U.S. Supreme Court on Monday refused to hear arguments in a case challenging the military’s “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy. (Francisco Kjolseth/The Salt Lake Tribune)

In her final year in the military, Air Force mortuary officer Valerie Larabee was called upon to care for four families grieving the suicides of fellow airmen.

“It really impacted me emotionally, but I couldn’t even go to the base chaplain to talk about it, because I was just so fearful,” she said. “I knew that he would ask, ‘Who else do you have in your life that can help comfort you?’ And I knew I couldn’t tell him.”

The U.S. Supreme Court declined to hear arguments Monday in a case challenging the constitutionality of the military’s controversial “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy, which bans openly gay people from serving in the U.S. military.

Gay-rights activists, including Larabee, the director of the Utah Pride Center, decried the court’s decision, which let stand a lower court ruling in favor of the ban. They said it would permit the military to continue to treat tens of thousands of gay and lesbian service members as second-class citizens.

“I am really hopeful about how things are going in our country right now and I feel like we have some tremendous opportunities,” Larabee said. “But this is disappointing.”

She’s hopeful? Why? Does she know something we don’t? Ahem. I assume she means because of Obama, though honestly – I just continue to be boggled by this – he has done NOTHING for our community, and CONTINUES to do nothing, and people STILL think he will?? Oh, but wait – there are REASONS why we’re at the back of the bus:

Noting the ongoing wars and the nation’s floundering economy, Larabee said she understands there are other pressing matters for Congress, the White House and the nation’s highest court to consider.

“But do I think our issues are every bit as important as those? Yes, I absolutely do,” she said, adding that she wished the court would have taken up the case.

But ya know what? If our President and Congress can decide to take over our banks and our private companies in such a short amount of time, something that was NOT on the (SPOKEN) Obama agenda, why the hell haven’t they gotten to this?? I mean, really – they have a MAJORITY – they should be able to take care of this in one day, right? That is, if they really intend to do anything about it. Here, I’ll even write it for them: “Because ‘Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” treats US Citizens in an unequal manner under the law; because we are losing tremendous assets as a result of this flawed law; because being homosexual does not in anyway impede one’s ability to serve one’s country as numerous allies have well demonstrated; we hereby repeal this biased law, and will reinstate ALL military personnel dismissed under this law who wish to return to service immediately.” There ya go. I’m giving you that for free. No charge. Take it.

Ahem. Then, maybe we could get back people like Lt. Choi, and Larabee:

Larabee spent 10 years in an Air Force uniform before resigning her commission in 1995 — two years after the Clinton-era law, which was thought of by many as a step forward for gay rights — went into effect. She said that she would have liked to have continued serving her country, but she couldn’t keep living a lie.

“I would still be in the military today if I didn’t have to lie about who I am,” she said. “My military service is the thing that I’m most proud of in my life.”

Having to keep secrets from those who are supposed to be brothers and sisters in arms “ends up causing a lot of anxiety,” she said. “It’s shameful that we should have to do that.”

Uh, yeah – that’s putting it mildly. Once again, people seem to be lieve the rhetoric instead of the reality:

But gay service members might not have to keep up the pretense for long. Author Nathaniel Frank said he figures the policy might last another two years, given the country’s need for service members at a time of war and a national sentiment he believes is moving in the direction of gay rights.

In his book Unfriendly Fire: How the Gay Ban Undermines the Military and Weakens America , Frank writes that gay service members have been forced out of service since the Revolutionary War. The first recorded case was in 1778, when Lt. Gotthold Enslin was kicked out of the Army in a ceremony in which an officer’s sword was broken over his head after he was caught in bed with another soldier.

Set against 230 years of military history, Frank said, Monday’s ruling is a blip on the radar.

“I wouldn’t think too much of this,” he said. “The court has a tradition of deferring to military and congressional judgment.”

He believes that President Barack Obama, though slow out of the gate on ending the ban as promised during his campaign, “still wants and needs this — and it should be played out not in the courts, but at the White House and in Congress.”

I mean, really – if Obama can take the time to give a command for Stephen Colbert’s hair to be cut, you don’t think he can place a phone call to Pelosi and Reid and tell them to get this done NOW? Please. Okay. Just keep telling yourself that if it makes you feel better, but bear in mind that this “belief” affects a lot of people.

Still, there is some light on this – not coming from Obama, of course:

There appears to be some movement on the issue in Congress, where California Democratic Rep. Ellen Tauscher has convinced 150 of her House colleagues to co-sponsor a bill that would end the ban. The Obama Administration, meanwhile, has made no specific move toward ending it and has declined to step in to stop the dismissal of gay service members, such as West Point graduate and Iraq War veteran Lt. Dan Choi. He is being processed for discharge from the Army after publicly disclosing that he is gay.

In an open letter to the president, the New York National Guard member took issue with the idea that his sexuality was a detriment to good order and discipline in his unit.

Much to the contrary, he wrote, “I refuse to lie to my commanders. I refuse to lie to my peers. I refuse to lie to my subordinates. I demand honesty and courage from my soldiers. They should demand the same from me.”

More than 230 service members (emphasis mine) have been kicked out of the military under the policy since Obama took office, according to the Service Members Legal Defense Fund.

We have only heard about the very tip of the iceberg, as I have said before. We have only heard about people like Lt. Choi who decided to “make a federal case” out of it. TWO HUNDRED AND THIRTY service members have already been kicked out. But people like Larabee use the excuse of us being in two wars as a rational for why Obama has not done anything about this yet? That is opposite world thinking, in my opinion – it is PRECISELY because we are in two wars now that we NEED to keep all of the people who are willing to fight for this country, not lose them over some ill-founded, homophobic, backwards, illogical, hateful law. We could USE an Arabic linguist like Lt. Choi at a time like this, don’t you think?

Repeal the law – it cannot POSSIBLY take that long. Like I said, look how fast Obama got some other things done he wanted done. If he wanted this law repealed already, he would have. Rather, Obama chose to not even weigh in on this to the Supreme Court. LOOK AT THE FACTS, not the rhetoric!

Here’s the bottom line to the LGBT community: STOP MAKING EXCUSES FOR THIS GUY. Stop humiliating yourselves hoping, crossing your fingers, and wishing that Obama is going to do right by you because he said he would, or because you think he’s “dreamy.” Had you opened your eyes and paid attention to his actions (or lack thereof) over the course of his political career, or the people with whom he chooses to surround himself, you wouldn’t have picked the guy you thought was “cool.” You would have supported the person who has stood with YOU for years. But you didn’t. And here we are, no farther along for it.

Aren’t you TIRED of begging for the crumbs to drop from the table?? Aren’t you ready to be a guest at the table, where you belong?? All the excuses in the world for Obama do nothing but let him off the hook, and diminish YOU. Seriously, you, we, deserve better. Deep down inside, you must know that is true. At least I HOPE you do…

The cream certainly rose to the top in the second round in the battle for the No Quarter Trophy. The second round of our March Madness tournament had few suprises and almost every match was a blowout. With the field narrowed to 16, we are down to the best of the best. To become our National Champion and wear the title of Biggest Ass on the American Political Landscape, someone will have to rise to the top over some of the most reprehensible people of our time.

BELOW, the scoop on the most suspenseful race last week (Michelle Obama vs. David Axelrod) and your virtual voting booth:

It was a surprising second round as three former National Champions were eliminated in matches that were not even close. Dick Cheney, Ann Coulter and Ted Kennedy (in a likely farewell performance) were all sent packing. The 12th seed in the Capitol Hill Bracket, Senator Claire McCaskill is the lone long shot left in the field as she easily disposed of the 4th seed John Boehner. The most exciting match occurred in the White House Bracket where number two seed Michelle Obama had her hands full with the 7th seed, David Axelrod.

Mrs. Obama pulled it out 54-46.

Your chance to vote in our Sweet 16 starts now. The polls will be open until 8:00 PM EDT on Tuesday. Here are the matchups.

White House Bracket
Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.
Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

Capitol Hill Bracket
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Note: There is a poll embedded within this post, please visit the site to participate in this post's poll.

Media Bracket
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At Large Bracket
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Just vote for who you think is the biggest ass in each matchup. Feel free to post additional comments below. Have fun with this. Don’t forget to join us on the Nocturnal Warrior Show on No Quarter Radio this Tuesday night at 9:00 PM EDT for the Sweet 16 results and Elite Eight preview.

It’s that time of year. If you are one of the lucky Americans still working in an office atmosphere, you probably have been inundated with bracket contests tied to the NCAA Tournament. I love the tournament and watch those games religiously, but here at No Quarter we deal with more serious fare and not everyone is a sports fan. So on Tuesday night’s edition of the Nocturnal Warrior Show on No Quarter Radio, we created a tournament of our own. You can listen to the show here (I highly recommend it; it was one of our better efforts.)

We revealed a field of 64 participants vying for the No Quarter Trophy. Our National Champion will be the person you pick as the Biggest Ass on the American Political Landscape.

We’ve broken the field in four brackets seeded 1 through 16 and have determined the matchups accordingly. All you have to do is tell us who you think is the winner of each matchup.

This will be a round by round affair. You can list your winners in the comment sections here or e-mail them to me at nocturnalwarriorshow@gmail.com. First-round winners will be announced on next Tuesday night’s Nocturnal Warrior Show. Feel free to submit all of your logic for making your picks.

So without further ado, here are the matchups.

White House Bracket
1st Seed Barack Obama vs. 16th Seed Bill Clinton
8th Seed Joe Biden vs. 9th Seed Robert Gibbs
5th Seed George W. Bush vs. 12th Seed Lawrence Summers
4th Seed Timothy Geithner vs. 13th Seed Susan Rice
6th Seed Rahm Emanuel vs. 11th Seed Jimmy Carter
3rd Seed Dick Cheney vs. 14th Seed Colin Powell
7th Seed David Axelrod vs. 10th Seed Eric Holder
2nd Seed Michelle Obama vs. 15th Seed Condoleeza Rice

Capitol Hill Bracket
1st Seed Nancy Pelosi vs. 16th Seed Christopher Dodd
8th Seed Charles Rangel vs. 9th Seed Mitch McConnel
5th Seed Chuck Schumer vs. 12th Seed Claire McCaskill
4th Seed John Boehner vs. 13th Seed Norm Coleman
6th Seed Edward Kennedy vs. 11th Seed Rolan Burris
3rd Seed Barney Frank vs. 14th Seed Eric Cantor
7th Seed Joe Lieberman vs. 10th Seed John Kerry
2nd Seed Harry Reid vs. 15th Seed Larry Craig

Media Bracket
1st Seed Keith Olbermann vs. 16th Seed Katie Couric
8th Seed William Kristol vs. 9th Seed Dick Morris
5th Seed Ann Coulter vs. 12th Laura Ingraham
4th Seed Rachael Maddow vs. 13th Seed Markos Moulitsos
6th Seed David Shuster vs. 11th Seed Ariana Huffington
3rd Seed Maureen Dowd vs. 14th Seed Rush Limbaugh
7th Seed Joe Klein vs. 10th Seed David Broder
2nd Seed Andrew Sullivan vs. 15th Jamal Simmons

At Large Bracket
1st Seed Chris Matthews vs. 16th Eliott Spitzer
8th Seed Rod Blagoevich vs. 9th Seed William Ayers
5th Seed Caroline Kennedy vs. 12th Seed John Edwards
4th Seed Donna Brazile vs. 13th Jeremiah Wright
6th Seed Bill Richardson vs. 11th Seed Michael Steele
3rd Seed Tom Daschle vs. 14th Seed Bobby Jindal
7th Seed Howard Dean vs. 10th Seed Alan Greenspan
2nd Seed Oprah Winfrey vs. 15th Seed Tim Kaine

There, you have it.. Just post up or e-mail us your first round picks and we will pare the field down. Have fun with this!!!

U.S. Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid needs 60 votes to close the debate on the $410 billion dollar omnibus spending bill and bring it to a Senate vote. As of this morning, he is one vote short. A few moderate Republicans that Reid was counting on have yet to climb on board. The GOP has some amendments of their own they would like to add to this bill and are trying to leverage their votes to push their proposals through.

Reid may just have to give in to some Republican demands, thanks to a dissenting vote from his own caucus. Senator Robert Menendez of New Jersey, a member of the Democratic leadership is voting no and is downright pissed off.

His anger has nothing to do with the massive spending by a government already in unfathomable debt or even the 9,000 plus earmarks attached to this drunken Capitol Hill spending spree.

What infuriates Menendez is that when his legislative aides read through the legislation online, they discovered language that eases restrictions on travel to Cuba and importing Cuban goods. Menendez would be the first to admit that he holds a minority view when it comes to dealing with the Castro government. As the son of Cuban immigrants, he has always taken a hard line on Cuban policy. He undoubtedly knew that with the Obama administration in charge, a change in policy was coming, but the way this was handled really has him steamed.

Shailagh Murphy reports in the Washington Post that Menendez even held off support on some administration appointees in protest.

“The process by which these changes have been forced upon this body is so deeply offensive to me, and so deeply undemocratic, that it puts the omnibus appropriations package in jeopardy, in spite of all the other tremendously important funding that this bill would provide,” the enraged son of Cuban immigrants said last week on the Senate floor. Menendez even slapped a hold on a pair of Obama nominees to draw attention to the issue.

Treasury officials, working with Reid’s office, continued yesterday to search for an administrative resolution with Menendez that would ensure a narrow interpretation of the legislative language in order to prevent gaping loopholes from developing. Menendez has pointed out that, had the bill sought significant changes in U.S. policy toward Iran or Venezuela, lawmakers would revolt. “What’s the difference with Cuba?” said Menendez spokesman Afshin Mohamadi.

No doubt, that Reid at some point will wrangle that last vote and everyone on the hill will have their pork and eat it too. He will even find a way to pacify Menendez. Yet, this little incident is just another reminder of why our government is broken to begin with. The Cuban issue is important enough to deserve its own debate on the floor. In typical congressional fashion, it was tacked on to a bill that had nothing to do with the issue. Whoever, added it to the omnibus spending bill was probably figuring that Menendez and his staff would not actually read the whole thing until it was too late.

It’s amazing what happens when your legislators have time (or at least their staffs have time) to read what they are voting on. The Menendez staff probably was going through this bill because lawmakers are starting to feel the heat after the e-mails and phone calls from angry constituents following the stimulus vote. They never expected Cuban policy to be part of the legislation they were reviewing.

Whether or not, the Cuban policy needs change is not the issue. The issue is that it shouldn’t have been in this bill in the first place. So good for Bob Menendez. Make Harry go find his vote somewhere else. It will certainly cost him.

Oh well. Those speeches attacking lobbyists have their usefulness, as guru it’s-all-about-winning David Axelrod has no doubt taught him to adopt as part of his populist schtick. And we know, from our experiences trying to get the truth out on this Obama operation, that the typical Obot will never know, or comprehend, who’s really burning the midnight oil to get this legislation ready for the big Friday votes.

NEXT: As I said in my earlier story, the timing of Judd Gregg’s recusal of himself from consideration to be Secretary of Commerce — especially after his awkward vote of abstention in the first go-round — is fascinating. Besides not doing this in the typical late Friday afternoon fashion to avoid media attention, Gregg chose to remove himself the day BEFORE both the Senate and House vote on the final bill.

And now, with news that Sen. Teddy Kennedy cannot make it to the Senate to cast a vote, because he’s returned to Florida for cancer treatments — and the certainty that Judd Gregg will change his vote to Nay — Harry Reid is rushing around looking for votes from the GOP. C-Span junkies, I hope you’ll keep us apprised of the timing of these critical votes. Here’s the Thursday summary from C-Span:

Gregg’s recusal has given Harry plenty to worry about:

Reid is also concerned because the three GOP moderates who support the bill – Olympia Snowe and Susan Collins of Maine, and Arlen Specter of Pennsylvania – suggested they did not want provide the decisive 60th vote for passage. That would likely happen without Kennedy voting.

So far, there’s no indication Reid has won any more GOP votes for the measure. But an aide to one of the GOP moderates, who asked not to be identified, doubted any of the moderates would drop off.

“I can not imagine any of them would back away after all the painstaking negotiations,” the aide said. …

– “Reid Looking For GOP Votes,” CNN Political Ticker.

And now here’s the pathetic Andrew Sullivan sullying the pages of the once-esteemed The Atlantic magazine:

Here’s a common-sense question: Wouldn’t the Democrats also be fighting a President McCain and his stimulus bill with everything they’ve got?

A side note: Speaking of McCain, this man has historically been very much the bipartisan player, and the fact that McCain is vehemently opposed to this legislation is a “tell” that this is one bad, bad piece of legislation. That can be gleaned from McCain’s past record of possessing the “true grit” to side with a bill if he finds it worthy, regardless of what his GOP hardliner associates say. This tells me that McCain clearly thinks the bill is junk, and that it won’t help the economy.)

Writes the conservative, pro-Iraq-war, Obama dipsomaniac Sullivan:

This much is now clear. Their clear and open intent is to do all they can, however they can, to sabotage the new administration (and the economy to boot). They want failure. Even now. Even after the last eight years. Even in a recession as steeply dangerous as this one. There are legitimate debates to be had; and then there is the cynicism and surrealism of total political war. We now should have even less doubt about what kind of people they are. And the mountain of partisan vitriol Obama will have to climb every day of the next four or eight years.

Boo hoo, Andrew.

Those heartless bastards dare to question “The One.” Get used to it, pal.

A “Savior-based” economy. Well, Heaven knows, Obama has certainly been set up as The Messiah, so it makes sense that this would be the kind of economy he would want. Ahem. (If you want to read the text of Gov. Sanford’s interview, please click HERE.) Bear in mind that SC has a very high unemployment rate right now, so we most definitely have a horse in this race. Gov. Sanford is not being a PollyAnna here. Rather than continue the band-aide mentality and prolong the agony like Japan did, Gov. Sanford wants to deal with the issues up front. The recovery would come sooner through the natural course of events (a bit of Darwinism, if you will), rather than prolonging it by continuing with the Stimulus Package that doesn’t do enough for job creation. It is an interesting take by the governor.

And another Southerner has spoken up, too. Rep. Heath Shuler, former NFL quarterback who is in his second term, represents the Western part of NC. And he supported Hillary Clinton for president. Well, he is taking Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid to task for their “failed leadership” in drafting this stimulus package. He claims they have failed by not engaging in a bi-partisan manner in detailing this package. He said in this AP article:

“In order for us to get the confidence of America, it has to be done in a bipartisan way,” Shuler said in Raleigh following an economic forum. “We have to have everyone – Democrats and Republicans standing on the stage with the administration – saying ‘We got something done that was efficient, stimulative and timely.’”

He continued:

“I truly feel that’s where maybe House leadership and Senate leadership have really failed,” Shuler said.

Wow. A Democrat who actually cares about fulfilling the promises made by Obama (though honestly – why did anyone believe him? There were NUMEROUS examples of Obama failing to work across the aisle during his exceedingly brief time in the Senate, unlike, say, CLINTON, who did actually work in a bi-partisan manner.).

Oh, and get this – Shuler thinks the package should actually be about job creation through infrastructure spending, though he was very concerned about the amount of debt the current package would create. Huh. What a concept. Shame that didn’t occur to any of these other bozos who allegedly represent us.

And I am sure you have heard by now about what else has been hidden in this package. Oh, this is a DOOZY. Seems there were some, um, INTERESTING little health care tidbits in the package the Senate is trying to ram through. Turns out there are three very odd components in there: 1. ration health care for senior citizens; 2. limit medical research; and 3. and monitoring doctors’ treatment decisions. You should hear the hooey being spewed by some of the senators I have seen today on how stuff like this got in there, and how they didn’t know if it was really there or not BECAUSE THEY HAVEN’T HAD TIME TO READ IT ALL!!!! Yet, they are VOTING on it this morning! As I have previously reported, there is all KINDS of pork built into this package, and now this on health care. Reports are that Tom Daschle got these items put in – which begs the question, HOW? He is not an elected official, and I am pretty sure he had already canned himself for the Health and Human Services job because he, too, is a tax evader (on a MASSIVE scale). Here is Megyn Kelly talking to Senator Arlen Specter about this add-in:

So, how did it get in there, then??? And, how are we to know if it is taken out? Since, as Senator Specter kept saying, this package is hundreds and hundreds of pages long, it seems to me that maybe, just MAYBE, SOMEONE could have taken the time to read the damn thing before they decided to vote on it. Oh, but that would mean “CATASTROPHE!!!!” to the country for them to actually take a day or two for them to have committee meetings and know what the hell is in there. How could I forget?? Pathetic. What a pathetic bunch of legislators they are. And Specter should be ashamed of himself for keeping his “commitment” to pass this package. His “commitment” SHOULD be to the people of the country. Funny how these senators and representatives keep forgetting that…

On a different note, wild fires continue to rage in Australia in an area beset with drought for a decade. Now they believe the fires were the work of an arsonist. Sadly, almost 200 people have died, some in the most horrific ways imaginable (trapped in their cars). Many people have lost their homes in these fires. It is a senseless tragedy, and if I may, let us just take a moment and remember that we are all connected. Even in the midst of the frustrations with our political leaders, our own economic or health concerns, let us remember that others are suffering, too, or have lost their lives, through no fault of their own. Rather, through an act, deliberate in nature, that has affected so many. And continues to do so, with thousands of firefighters working to squelch these flames. We are, all of us, connected.

My thoughts and prayers go out for those lost, and for those who have lost so much…May these fires be contained quickly, and with no more loss of life…

The American populace knows that the primary architects in the formulation of the Stimulus Plan working its way through Congress are Rahm Emanuel, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid. This contingent, along with President Obama, have not been bashful in stating they view the November election results as effectively a mandate to change policies emanating from Washington.

Against that backdrop, the initially proposed Stimulus Plan was so loaded with pork that the Republicans and the American population at large slammed it as more a promotion of the

Martin Feldstein

I will give President Obama credit for formulating a Panel to Advise Obama on Economy.

This panel will be known as the White House Economic Recovery Advisory Board. The Board will be headed by former Fed chair Paul Volcker. He will be joined by Jeff Immelt of GE, James Owens of Caterpillar, William Donaldson, former SEC chair, Roger Ferguson Jr. of TIAA-CREF, Richard Trumka of AFL-CIO, Anna Burger of SEIU, and Martin Feldstein, renowned Harvard economist. The group will be guided by Austan Goolsbee, an economic adviser to the White House.

Do you think President Obama and his economic team would listen to Mr. Feldstein or is that a “mere courtesy” having him on the board? Let’s review what Mr. Feldstein said about the Stimulus Plan just last week.

Regarding the proposed Stimulus Plan, Martin Feldstein offered that it is far better to go back to work and do it right versus merely doing it fast:

An $800 Billion Mistake

By Martin Feldstein
The Washington Post
Thursday, January 29, 2009

As a conservative economist, I might be expected to oppose a stimulus plan. In fact, on
this page in October, I declared my support for a stimulus. But the fiscal package now
before Congress needs to be thoroughly revised. In its current form, it does too little to
raise national spending and employment. It would be better for the Senate to delay
legislation for a month, or even two, if that’s what it takes to produce a much better bill.
We cannot afford an $800 billion mistake.

Start with the tax side. The plan is to give a tax cut of $500 a year for two years to each
employed person. That’s not a good way to increase consumer spending. Experience
shows that the money from such temporary, lump-sum tax cuts is largely saved or used
to pay down debt. Only about 15 percent of last year’s tax rebates led to additional
spending.

The proposed business tax cuts are also likely to do little to increase business investment
and employment. The extended loss “carrybacks” are primarily lump-sum payments to
selected companies. The bonus depreciation plan would do little to raise capital spending
in the current environment of weak demand because the tax benefits in the early years
would be recaptured later.

Instead, the tax changes should focus on providing incentives to households and
businesses to increase current spending. Why not a temporary refundable tax credit to
households that purchase cars or other major consumer durables, analogous to the
investment tax credit for businesses? Or a temporary tax credit for home improvements?
In that way, the same total tax reduction could produce much more spending and
employment.

Postponing the scheduled increase in the tax on dividends and capital gains would raise
share prices, leading to increased consumer spending and, by lowering the cost of capital,
more business investment.

On the spending side, the stimulus package is full of well-intended items that,
unfortunately, are not likely to do much for employment. Computerizing the medical
records of every American over the next five years is desirable, but it is not a cost-
effective way to create jobs. Has anyone gone through the (long) list of proposed
appropriations and asked how many jobs each would create per dollar of increased
national debt?

The largest proposed outlays amount to just writing unrestricted checks to state
governments. Nearly $100 billion would result from increasing the “Medicaid matching
rate,” a technique for reducing states’ Medicaid costs to free up state money for spending
on anything governors and state legislators want. An additional $80 billion would be given
out for “state fiscal relief.” Will these vast sums actually lead to additional spending, or will
they merely finance state transfer payments or relieve state governments of the need for
temporary tax hikes or bond issues?

The plan to finance health insurance premiums for the unemployed would actually
increase unemployment by giving employers an incentive to lay off workers rather than
pay health premiums during a time of weak demand. And this supposedly two-year
program would create a precedent that could be hard to reverse.

A large fraction of the stimulus proposal is devoted to infrastructure projects that will
spend out very slowly, not with the speed needed to help the economy in 2009 and 2010.
The Congressional Budget Office estimates that less than one-fifth of the $50 billion of
proposed spending on energy and water would occur by the end of 2010.

If rapid spending on things that need to be done is a criterion of choice, the plan should
include higher defense outlays, including replacing and repairing supplies and equipment,
needed after five years of fighting. The military can increase its level of procurement very
rapidly. Yet the proposed spending plan includes less than $5 billion for defense, only
about one-half of 1 percent of the total package.

Infrastructure spending on domestic military bases can also proceed more rapidly than
infrastructure spending in the civilian economy. And military procurement overwhelmingly
involves American-made products. Since much of this military spending will have to be
done eventually, it makes sense to do it now, when there is substantial excess capacity in
the manufacturing sector. In addition, a temporary increase in military recruiting and
training would reduce unemployment directly, create a more skilled civilian workforce and
expand the military reserves.

All new spending and tax changes should have explicit time limits that prevent ever-
increasing additions to the national debt. Similarly, spending programs should not create
political dynamics that will make them hard to end.

The problem with the current stimulus plan is not that it is too big but that it delivers too
little extra employment and income for such a large fiscal deficit. It is worth taking the
time to get it right.

The writer, an economics professor at Harvard University, is president emeritus of the
National Bureau of Economic Research.

Barack, how about you and Martin go for a little walk. Take your time!!

LD

US Senators are still debating and fighting over the stimulus package Obama wants. People are furious about the amount the House passed, so what does the Senate do? Increases it by over $100 BILLION dollars. I am not kidding. Moderate Republicans and Democrats (”Gang of 18″) have been working together to try and cut out the pork, and somehow today, Friday, the amount has gone to $920 BILLION. Wow. Talk about not listening to the constituency (what else is new), whose support for this package has fallen to 37%.

But get this. Listen to what Senator Harry Reid said to the “Gang of 18″:

Evidently, Reid has forgotten who he is supposed to be serving – US, not Obama! Checks and balances, serving the people, protecting the Constitution – these are not small matters, Senator Reid. And if Obama’s package is a pile of crap – which it is, SOMEONE needs to be protecting US and the future generations who will be repaying this money.

You know, it was not that long ago that the Democrats were assailing the Republicans for doing Bush’s bidding in lockstep, or seemingly without critical thought. It seems the only thing that has changed is the letter beside the majority in power. How quickly the Democrats have forgotten the frustration and anger of being the minority party. How sad that they seem to have embodied the very characteristics against which they fought. And, how sad that anyone thought anything would be different. Just sayin’.

As long as the Democrats want crap in this bill like a FRISBEE GOLF COURSE, or money for Las Vegas to buy NEON SIGNS, they deserve to have it held up. We should DEMAND that they hold it up until it is a bill that does not squander OUR money, and does what it is intended to do – stimulate the economy. And if that means Obama doesn’t get it passed when HE wants it, too damn bad. It’s not his money these bozos want to spend on a freakin’ frisbee golf course, it’s ours. As I keep saying, these are SERIOUS times, people – time to act like adults already.

Seems to me like this is a good time to re-run he following video:

In The Know: Should The Government Stop Dumping Money Into A Giant Hole?

Yeah. And how.

Now, here’s another jaw-dropping observation about how the Obama administration is NOT operating at maximum energy and force:

Tonight, I heard that Barack Obama was stunned that Harry Reid had trouble keeping even his own Democrats in line. Doesn’t Obama realize that many of these Democrats come from rather conservative states, and that they’re under intense pressure from consituents? One “talking head” i heard said that letters and faxes are running 100 to 1 against the package! That is a LOT of pressure on an elected official! Which means one thing: Obama has not only lost control of the message, he has failed to energize his own carefully developed base of e-mail addresses to bombard Congressional offices with messages of support for Obama! Amazing, it is. Just amazing. Perhaps this is why, as Ani told us, Obama’s surrogates had to urge supporters to write kindly letters to the prez. You MUST read Ani’s article, “Maureen Dowd Berates Obama While Senators Durbin and Boxer Want Us To Kiss-y The Prez and Make-y Better.” (Ani’s piece is so good that I’m reprinting it shortly after this goes up.)

David Corn of The Nation raised that vital point: Why hasn’t Obama mobilized his army of millions to pressure their Senators and Representatives? Why hasn’t Obama and his highly successful campaign staffers like David Axelrod, now ensconced in the White House, had people sending out e-mails urging his supporters to write, call and e-mail, just like they did so often for Obama during the election cycle? In “Will Obama Mobilize His Millions of Supporters? The White House Responds,” Corn writes:

On Friday morning, I asked, “Will Obama mobilize his millions?” By that, I meant would he activate the 13 million or so Americans who had signed up with his campaign in order to pass the stimulus bill. Organizing for America, the spin-off of the Obama presidential campaign, is holding house parties on the weekend to discuss the recovery package. But Obama has yet truly to unleash his supporters. His push for the economic bill has not had much of a grassroots component.

On Friday afternoon, I was able to ask White House press secretary Robert Gibbs about this. First, I inquired if President Obama wanted the folks attending the weekend house meetings to pressure members of Congress to support the stimulus bill. (As of this writing, the bill, which had passed the House, was heading toward a vote in the Senate. After that, the two versions will have be reconciled and a final version approved by both chambers.) Gibbs replied with something of a platitudinous reply, noting that the president always encourages citizens to be involved in their government.

I followed up by noting that when Ronald Reagan came to Washington in 1981, determined to pass an economic package of tax cuts and draconian cuts in social programs, he delivered multiple televised addresses and urged his supporters to call their members of Congress and demand passage of this legislation. The phones on Capitol Hill lit up; the legislation was passed–over the objections of the leaders of the Democratic-controlled House. Would President Obama, I asked Gibbs, make a similarly explicit call. “We’ll ask those who support him…to move this economy forward,” Gibbs said.

In other words, maybe.

Why hasn’t the Obama White House already directly engaged its supporters in this fight? After all, Obama has repeatedly said this is the number-one priority of his administration. Perhaps Obama aides initially thought that it would not be necessary to call in its troops. If so, that was a miscalculation on at least two counts. First, it does seem that Obama will have to show some political muscle to get this bill all the way through Congress. Second, whether or not the Obama White House needed its supporters to win this thing, it would have been smart for the White House to have involved its backers in its first–and most important–initiative. That would give these people a sense of ownership. And what could be a better way of keeping those millions (and others) engaged. …

Just as I wrote in my previous article on the census mess, this is White House 101 stuff! Are none of these people thinking imaginatively of ways they can fashion and change public opinion on this bill?

Right now, the Republicans are running away with the positive press and the popular sentiments, while the Democrats are looking like a bunch of disorganized, dunderhead clowns!

I published this satire script about a month ago here at No Quarter.  It hit the front page the same day as Governor-Gate hit and right after Cardboard-Cutout-Gate was all over the place.

You remember back in mid-December, right after the infamous picture of Obama’s speech writer copping a faux feel-up of a cardboard-cutout full-size replica of Secretary of State (to be) Hillary Clinton.  And immediately after that outrageous fiasco, the news hit about Governor Blagojevich trying to sell Obama’s Senate seat to the highest bidder.

Right between those two major events, that’s when this little skit got published.  It may as well not have been published at all, for all the attention it got.  (pout)

And, taking some of the blame on myself (mark your calendars), I didn’t really set it up properly.  I just published it as a script, with no intro, except to belabor the obvious point that it was satire and not an actual transcript of a real recording.

So let me do a little set-up now:

All through 2008, we’d been wondering how in the hell it came to pass that the Democratic National Committee decided to throw its weight behind Obama, and to deliberately sabotage Hillary’s campaign for the nomination.

It had to be a conspiracy of some kind!  You know it’s true!  People were talking about Hillary being the next president even before 2004!  So what happened?

Well, believe what you want, but this is how it might have happened, IMHO.  I was thinking, “Oh, to be a fly on the wall in that conversation!”  And this script was the result of my daydreaming about what that fly might have heard.

———————————————————————————————-

“Fly on the Wall (do-over)”

In an office meeting room are The Fetid Four: Howard Dean, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid, and Donna Brazile. They are stewing over the Democratic loss in the election of 2004, and starting to think ahead to 2008.

HOWARD: (both hands pressed to his temples in anguish) I can’t believe Kerry lost!  Bush is so awful!

NANCY:  He’s a war criminal.  He should be impeached!

DONNA:  Yes!  And Cheney, too!  And you know what that means… (nudges Nancy) …Madam President!

(room erupts in nervous laughter)

HARRY:  Even if you had the votes to impeach in the House, you know that in the Senate we only have a one-vote majority…

NANCY: (cutting him off) That is so not gonna happen, so let’s just play the cards we’re dealt.

(general murmur of agreement)

HOWARD: (peering over his glasses) Well, one thing is for certain, we’ll win the next one, no matter who we run!

NANCY:  Absolutely!

DONNA:  Hell, even I could win it!

HARRY: (shaking head) Let’s not get carried away.

DONNA: (indignantly) Oh, thanks!

NANCY:  But I get your point.  Doesn’t matter anyway, because Her Nibs, Queen Hillary, is the heiress-apparent.

HARRY:  It’s an abomination!  What has she got, like two years in Congress?

DONNA:  Hillary… (makes gagging noises)

HOWARD: (laughing cautiously as he loosens his tie) I don’t think we can stop her… unless…

NANCY:  Unless what, Doc?  You planning on running again?

HOWARD: (wistfully) No, no, no… unless you think I should…

HARRY:  Oh, for the love of…

DONNA:  I don’t think so!

HARRY:  OK, so who can beat her?  She’s got all the momentum right now.  And the money.  She’s a walking ATM!

NANCY:  Let’s worry about the money later.  Even assuming she has the most cash, money’s not everything.

DONNA:  True.  If it was,  Soros would be running!

(Big laughter all around)

HOWARD:  Problem is, he’s not Natural Born.

HARRY:  You mean… he was born Caesarian?

HOWARD: (laughing) Good one!

HARRY:  Huh?

NANCY:  Natural born citizen!  Have you ever actually read the Constitution?  Article II?

HARRY: (blushing and flustered) Yes, I’ve read it!  Twice!  What do you think I am, an idiot?

(uncomfortable silence for several seconds)

HARRY: (struggling to recompose and assume an air of authority) Look, you know what I meant!  It was a joke!

NANCY:  Of course.

DONNA:  Sure it was.

HOWARD:  Well, I thought it was funny!

DONNA:  You would!

NANCY:  Medical humor, doc?

HOWARD:  Sure!  I mean, from an obstetrician’s point of view.

HARRY: (snorts and snickers)

DONNA:  Let’s not go there!

NANCY:  Come on, children! Let’s focus!

DONNA:  Well, anyway, like I was TRYING to say before… I think anyone we nominate is a shoo-in!

HARRY:  I thought it was “shoe-in.”

NANCY:  What?

HOWARD:  That makes no sense at all!  You mean like a boot?

NANCY:  No, it’s “shoo!” Like in “shoo fly!”  Or you “shoo” the horse into the barn.

DONNA:  What are you talking about?

HOWARD:  Horse shoes?

DONNA: (shaking her head in bewilderment, pronounces words studiously) Shoo.  Shoe.  Sorry, I don’t hear any difference!

NANCY:  Well, it’s “shoo.”

HARRY:  Are you sure?  Because I always thought it was like “shoe in,” like … (pushes with foot)

NANCY:  What, you’re going to kick the candidate into office against his will?

HOWARD:  I agree.  It’s “shoo.”  Like you’re just shooing them through without effort, because there’s no resistance.

HARRY:  I still think it’s “shoe.”

DONNA: (getting visibly agitated) Look! It doesn’t matter!  Our guy is going to win, that’s my point!

NANCY:  Or girl… woman I mean.

(all eyes turn to Nancy warily)

NANCY:  Well, not me, obviously…

HARRY:  Obviously…

DONNA:  Although it would be great to have a woman president… I just don’t want it to be Hillary!

NANCY:  No shit!

HOWARD:  Well, I agree to an extent.  I mean, as liberals, and as leaders of the Democratic Party, I do think it’s our duty to use this once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to make some history.  “The first female president!”

NANCY:  Yes! But not that female!

DONNA:  We agree on that, sis! (high-fives Nancy)

HARRY:  Then who?  Kathy Sebelius?

(general mumbling of discontent)

HOWARD:  Claire McCaskill?

NANCY:  Oh, please!  She’s… (shakes her head) No. Not her!

DONNA:  What if it’s not a woman?

HARRY:  Claire McCaskill’s not a woman?

(others ignore him)

HOWARD:  What do you have in mind, Donna?

DONNA:  What if…?  What if it’s a man, but a man of color?

HARRY: (does double take) You mean Bill Richardson?

HOWARD:  Oh, good lord…

DONNA:  No, I was just thinking about our keynote speaker at the convention.

NANCY: (smirks, knowingly) You still carrying a torch for him?

DONNA: (elbows Nancy sharply, glaring) No!

HOWARD:  Something I should know about?

HARRY:  I think she’s talking about Senator Obama, but we can’t run him.  He’s totally green behind the ears!

HOWARD:  Green behind the ears?  What the hell does that mean?

NANCY:  Well, Donna thinks he’s hot!

DONNA: (pouts and kicks Nancy under the table) Shut up!

HOWARD:  OK, so we know he’s hot and green behind the ears.  What else do we know about him?

HARRY:  Well, I hear he’s pretty much broke.  Had to do some financial flim-flam just to buy a house.

HOWARD:  Anything illegal?

HARRY: (clears throat) I don’t know all the details, but I heard some rules were bent at the bank.  Some third party, a shyster lawyer or mob guy or something…

HOWARD:  O-keeeeeeeeeeeeeee!  “Next!” Who else we got?

DONNA:  Now wait a minute!  Let’s not rule him out yet.  Look, you know a lot of women are still mad at Hillary for staying with Bill after he had sex, or whatever he had, with Miss Fatty Blue Dress.

NANCY:  True.  She should have at least done a Bobbitt on him. (makes scissors gesture)

HOWARD:  Ouch! For a BJ?

HARRY:  Don’t forget the cigar.

NANCY:  Oh gaaaaaaaawd… I’ve been trying to forget it!

DONNA:  My point is that just because she’s a female, doesn’t mean most women will vote for her.  She’s not a shoo… I mean it’s not written in stone.

HARRY:  “Etched in stone.”

HOWARD:   I agree. It’s “etched.”

DONNA: (slams both palms on the table) Whatever!  I’m just saying “forget Hillary!” The next election is ours!  We can’t lose!  Let’s make some real history!  Now, while we can!  It’s a chance of a lifetime!  Let’s elect a black man!

NANCY:  Agreed.  We can do the woman later.

HOWARD:  Woohoo!  Sounds like a party!

HARRY:  Are you sure he’s black?  I heard he was Indonesian or something?

HOWARD: (enunciates the name slowly) O-bah-ma… I don’t know, that sounds pretty African to me!

DONNA: (frowning) He’s half white, half African.  In fact, you can’t get much more African than him.  He says in his book that his daddy was from Kenya.

HARRY:  He’s written a book?

NANCY:  An autobiography.

HOWARD:  How many pages?  Three? (laughs loudly)

DONNA:  Look, he’s an excellent speaker!  He’s handsome, he’s got charisma, he’s a cool guy, and he’s… good-looking.

NANCY:  I think you’ve established that you think he’s attractive.

DONNA:  Well?  Isn’t he?

NANCY:  Not to me.

DONNA:  Why?

NANCY:  Oh, I don’t know, he’s just not my type, I guess.

DONNA:  You mean black?

HOWARD: (gasps) Uh-oh!

HARRY:  You’re a racist?

NANCY:  No!  That’s not what I meant!

DONNA:  Uh-huh.  Then what do you find not attractive about him?

NANCY:  He’s just, I don’t know, too skinny, for one thing.  And those ears!

DONNA:  That sounds pretty racist to me!

NANCY:  What?  Are you kidding me?

HOWARD:  Wait a minute, I think we’re onto something here!

HARRY:  America isn’t ready for a black president.  Let’s face it.

DONNA:  You too?

NANCY:  See?  I’m not the racist, he’s the racist!

HARRY:  I am not a racist!

NANCY:  Well, neither am I!  I’d vote for him!

HARRY:  Well, so would I!  But will the teamsters?

HOWARD: (cynically) The teamsters will do whatever we tell them to, as usual.

NANCY:  OK, so let’s be serious a minute…

DONNA:  I am serious!  Think about it.  If the four of us get behind one candidate, we can stop Hillary.  I know we can!  We just need to get my friends at Acorn to get the vote out in the first couple of primaries and take the momentum away from her!

HOWARD:  Acorn?  In Iowa?  Have you ever been to Iowa?  I have!

NANCY:  Yeah, so we’ve heard.

HARRY:  How could we not hear?  As loud as you yelled… Yahoooooo!

NANCY:  No, it was more like Yeehaaaaaaaaaaaaw!

DONNA:  If we can try to stay on topic… I really think we can pull this off!  Seriously!  Just let me spell it out for you.  First, it’s our turn, the Democrats I mean, and after Bush and Cheney, it doesn’t really matter who we nominate.  We will win!  That’s why everyone thinks Hillary has it made.  But it doesn’t have to be her.  We can take her down if we play it right.  We’ve got Acorn on our side!

HOWARD:  Not in Iowa, we don’t!  In Iowa, it’s about corn, not Acorn.  Hell, it’s more white-bread than New Hampshire.  And do you think Acorn can even find enough voters in Iowa to win?  You’ve got the Clinton Machine, you’ve got pretty-boy Edwards…

DONNA: (quickly draws a crude map) Lookie here.  You’ve got Iowa here, and right next door, Illinois.  That’s Barack’s state.

NANCY:  Oh, I see!  Illinois is close enough to Iowa, you think voters will identify with the guy from the next-door state!  That might help.

DONNA:  Well, that’s part of it, but think about this.  These are caucuses, not elections.  And we can run a shitload of buses from Chicago, Detroit, Minneapolis, St. Louis, Kansas City… all full of brand new Iowa voters.  They swamp the caucuses, because even in Iowa hardly anyone goes to those things.  It would only take about one or two busloads per precinct.  Our guys swarm in, make a lot of noise, a little intimidation, and before the Clintons know what hit them, Hillary’s toast!

NANCY:  I think you’ve got something here!  But are you sure we can sell America on voting for an African-American man with a name that rhymes with Osama?

HARRY:  There you go being racist again!

NANCY:  I am not a racist!

DONNA:  I can’t believe you’re so racist!  Stop the hate!

HOWARD: (slaps table hard) That’s it! That’s how we sell it!  If anyone questions his name, his character, his background, anything… we play the race card!  And good old white liberal guilt will shame them into voting for him!

HARRY:  Brilliant!

NANCY:  I love it!  It gives me hope! Maybe we canchange candidates!

DONNA: Yes, we can!

HOWARD: (scribbling notes furiously) This is the best idea we’ve had in a loooooooooong time!

DONNA:  Too long!

NANCY:  Much too long!

HARRY:  That’s what she said!

“Roland Burris is a good man and a fine public servant, but the Senate Democrats made it clear weeks ago that they cannot accept an appointment made by a governor who is accused of selling this very Senate seat. I agree with their decision, and it is extremely disappointing that Governor Blagojevich has chosen to ignore it. I believe the best resolution would be for the Governor to resign his office and allow a lawful and appropriate process of succession to take place. While Governor Blagojevich is entitled to his day in court, the people of Illinois are entitled to a functioning government and major decisions free of taint and controversy,” said President-elect Obama.

Oh, no. Obama is “extremely disappointed.” Well, join the freakin’ club, Obama. You aren’t the only one. There are millions of us who are disappointed. Heck, despairing might even be the word of choice. But I digress.

Now, Obama has changed his tune (surprise!!!!!). According to this CBS Report, Obama is now saying:

Mr. Obama was just asked about the Burris appointment during his morning press conference. The president-elect did not take a position, saying it was “a Senate matter.”

Mr. Obama noted he had known Burris for years, adding: “If he gets seated, then I’m going to work with Roland Burris, just like I work with all the other senators.”

Newsflash from the Department of Duh: You already took a position, Mr. Obama. Perhaps YOU should learn hot to use that whole Google thing to remind yourself of what you said about a week ago. Just sayin’.

And for the record, the Senate does NOT get to decide who they will allow in or not. It’s a matter of who each state sends. You might want to go take another little look-see at that pesky piece of paper you find to be so “deeply flawed,” the Constitution. Just a thought!

But Obama isn’t the only one who is probably making Burris’ head spin (and mine). The above-mentioned Senate owner (hey, that’s how he is acting), Harry Reid. His constant stand that Burris will now be admitted to his playgroup is now weakening:

After repeatedly saying they wouldn’t accept him and turning him away Tuesday, it now appears that Senate Democrats eventually plan to seat Roland Burris after all.

After Burris met privately with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid and Senator Dick Durbin of Illinois, Reid told reporters today that he hopes “sooner rather than later” the full Senate will vote on whether to accept Burris.

And get this:

Reid said he and Burris met for 45 minutes and since he had “never met the man,” it was “very enlightening,” calling Burris “obviously very engaging, a very nice man.”

Well, by all means, Harry, if the only criterion you have is if you think someone is “nice” enough, glad to hear Burris suits you on that level.

I have written about this before, but holy crap – our Senate is a very small junior high school. Grow the hell up already, Harry!! Sheesh!

By the way, in the article linked above about Reid, there is a link to a US News and World Report article (by Michael Barone)regarding issues of legality and seating Burris. I’ll bottom-line it for you: they have to seat him.

In the meantime, I think the following should be Burris’ theme song:

So, what will it be? Will he stay or will he go?