How in the hell is Holder, and every single one of the administrators who went along with this, not indicted and facing trial? I’m no attorney, but I am fairly certain that money laundering is ILLEGAL, especially for the head of the US Justice Department.

As you might suspect, this is all part and parcel of the horrendously stupid “Fast and Furious” gun-walking program. Rep. Darrell Issa is doing his best to uncover the extent of this program under Holder:

[snip] The New York Times reported on Sunday that “in operations supervised by the Justice Department and orchestrated to get around sovereignty restrictions” drug enforcement agents “laundered or smuggled millions of dollars in drug proceeds as part of Washington’s expanding role in Mexico’s fight against drug cartels.”

In a Monday letter to Attorney General Eric Holder, Issa announced he’s investigating the allegations made against the DEA in the New York Times article.

“As you are fully aware, since March of this year, I have been investigating the reckless tactics — in particular gunwalking — used in ATF’s Operation Fast and Furious,” Issa wrote. “That operation, which you personally acknowledged was ‘fundamentally flawed,’ failed spectacularly to meet its objective of bring down Mexican drug cartels. Precisely because the ends do not justify the means, the law limits the conduct alleged in this story.”

“Apparently, this same goal of dismantling Mexican drug cartels motivated the Drug Enforcement Administration in aiding and abetting these same cartels in laundering millions of dollars in cash,” Issa continued. “In fact, The New York Times reports that agents needed to seek Department approval to launder amounts greater than $10 million in any single operation.”

Issa wrote that, according to the report, many agents said the $10 million requirement was frequently “waived” because it was treated more like a guideline. He said that means “hundreds of millions of dollars” could’ve been “laundered” into the hands of drug cartels by the Obama administration and Holder’s Justice Department. (Click here to read the rest.)

This just gets worse and worse with every passing day. The NY Times article stated that the DEA did this in order to see how the drug cartels move their money. Because I am sure the DEA/DOJ just couldn’t figure it out any other way than laundering potentially hundreds of millions of dollars. This isn’t just folly, this is sheer insanity, and it starts at the top – all the way to the top with Obama, who is still standing behind Holder. Hell, he picked him in the FIRST place, so that tells you something right there.

And speaking of following the money, former NJ Governor and US Senator, Jon Corzine, is about to be on the hot seat this Thursday regarding the disappearance of $1.2 BILLION of investors’ money at MF Global. That is all bad enough, but like the “Fast and Furious” program, with every day, more information leaks out. Now it seems that Corzine threatened to quit his post if he was not allowed to throw money into European bonds.

And you may recall, Jon Corzine played an integral part in helping this Administration as evidenced by both President Obama and VP Biden heaping praise on Corzine in this video:

Click here to view the embedded video.

Well, I think that explains a LOT, doesn’t it? But there is oh, so much more on this issue. Guess who sits on the advisory board of the PR Firm that worked for MF Global, and which provided financial advice to MF Global? That would be President Clinton. Former PM Tony Blair, too, but that’s the U.K.’s problem. The company, Teneo Holdings, was paid $625,000 for it’s work with MF Global:

[snip] Clinton’s office insists the former president did not profit from the relationship between MF Global and Teneo Holdings, where he is chairman of the advisory board. But Teneo, on whose advisory board former British Prime Minister Tony Blair also sits, was paid $125,000 a month for at least five months in one of MF’s biggest consulting arrangements, according to sources at the brokerage house.

The relationship was controversial within MF Global even before the company’s financial problems hit the news as executives questioned why an outside firm was needed for work that had long been done in-house.

“I don’t know what they did,” one MF source said. “It was always unclear.” (Click here to read the rest.)

Yes, Obama and Biden’s financial guru will be spending some quality time in front of Congress trying to explain why he was so gung-ho about investing in European bonds, and how $1.2 Billion of investors’ money disappeared.

The workers at MF Global want to know, too, and are suing the executives who ran MF Global into the ground. Serves them right. I hope the workers get a ton of money from them.

I hope Rep. Issa and Congress continues to follow these money trails to the very end. And I hope some of these folks, like Holder and Corzine, end up in a room cell of their own. They deserve nothing less, don’t you think?

These progressive champions don’t seem to realize they have delivered the President more grievous insults than the ones they have long sought to protect him from. By framing President Obama as lacking in leadership skills, or being held captive by the opposition party, or too beholden to the far left of his own party, these pundits are telegraphing their belief that he is too soft, not a capable executive, not responsible for his own actions and a victim.

Their reasons for depicting Obama this way are their own, but I suspect it is too horrible for them to contemplate that they were taken in by branding and attractive rhetoric. Mr. Obama is doing precisely what he has done since well before his election – capitulate in the face of challenge. Were the “principles” pundits expected the President to uphold really his or theirs? A candidate must draw a line in the sand via his or her own record, demonstrating a willingness to go down fighting for a cause over the course of years before it can be proven that such principles are any more than projections by optimists wanting to be swept up by “history” and romance.

His State Senate record in Illinois recalled a man who voted “present” 130 times, along with 6 “wrong” or “oops, I hit the wrong button” votes. As a freshman US Senator he missed over 40% of his votes, particularly risky ones. In 2008, he reneged on FISA, was guilty of double dealing on NAFTA, reneged on his written promise to take public financing in his presidential campaign, and surrounded himself with corporatist advisors like Austan Goolsbee who have long favored privatizing Social Security. Contrary to his upstart, new kind of politics image, he receiving more money from Wall Street than any other candidate and was backed by the old guard of the Democratic Party. He praised President Reagan while belittling President Clinton and campaigned down south with Donnie McCurkin, ex-gay man “reformed through prayer. That the Obamas had long lived beyond their own means, receiving help with their house purchase from now convicted felon Tony Rezko and his wife should have given pundits pause.

This list went largely unchecked.

Most important, though the left favored Obama because of his purported anti-war stance, his little known 2002 anti-war speech regarding Iraq involved no vote or political risk yet when in the Senate three years later, he voted twice to continue funding a war he disagreed with.

Reviewing the above facts along with contradictory campaign promises Mr. Obama made in 2008, one has to wonder who these pundits thought they were urging the rest of us to vote for. And why do they complain that he is behaving in an unthinkable or incomprehensible way now? If one logically considers his record and his actions, not just his words, his current behavior was at least somewhat predictable via his past deeds.

President Obama showed himself to be a political opportunist wont to help those who helped him the most. Ergo, special considerations to unions and corporate bailouts by the truckload. This is not to fault Mr. Obama by the way. He presented his best self to the American people. If there were those who chose not to question his contradictions, who would not take advantage of such great good fortune?

The fault and responsibility must be placed squarely on the shoulders of the mainstream media and pundit class who abjectly refused to do their jobs in vetting Mr. Obama as a candidate. Those of us on the ground who saw inconsistencies and voiced our concerns were roundly and viciously insulted.

Further, the current furious flailing and complaints of liberal pundits are as empty and false as their previous accusations of “racism” were toward President Obama’s critics. Come 2012, they will all fall in line behind his candidacy, believing Republicans to be six kinds of evil. This is precisely why our President feels comfortable capitulating on tax rates, or pushing healthcare (without a public option) that is years away from being fully enacted rather than concentrating on putting Americans back to work. As far as President Obama is concerned, the left “has nowhere else to go,” despite Politico posting an article yesterday stating that President Obama was continuing and even growing a number of President Bush’s past policies.

While editorials on Huffington Post, diaries on DailyKos along with other print media are rumbling about a primary challenge to President Obama in 2012, the likelihood of its success is slim. And whether one feels the left’s wish list is right or wrong headed, or “sanctimonious” – as President Obama just called it – is hardly the point. Unless those who are furious now are willing to lose to win, offering more than idle threats, we will have more of the same rhetoric that we have been getting from both parties for years – lip service paid to a cause without effective solutions or legislation to back it up.

Solutions, anyone?

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi bashed White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs Tuesday night, even as the president’s top spokesman continued to backpedal from his assertion that Democrats could lose control of the House in the November election.

“How could [Gibbs] know what is going on in our districts?” Pelosi told her members in the caucus meeting in the basement of the Capitol Tuesday night. “Some may weigh his words more than others. We have made our disagreement known to the White House.”

The hostility escalated when Democratic lawmakers accused the White House of losing the messaging wars. Are some Dem lawmakers implying that if President Obama, Gibbs et al had done a better job of “selling” their non-working policies to the American people, House Dems wouldn’t be facing the prospect of such huge losses in November?

This is a wake up call to Ms. Pelosi and those who stand in lock step with her – If you have a good product – it sells itself.

I think we would prefer better crafted legislation to a better sales pitch. Putting the check mark next to the “DONE” box just to parade around with a giant gavel and goofy smile pasted on your face does not substitute for putting Americans back to work, passing health care legislation that won’t bankrupt the country or passing a stimulus bill that actually stimulates something beyond pet pork projects.

Even Arianna Huffington, a big Obama ally, has complained bitterly that the Wall St. reform package doesn’t go far enough or protect us from “too big to fail.” Then again, she is another political opportunist who has lately taken to agreeing with Tea Party protests and even Sarah Palin. She must be seeing the writing on the wall, too.

It is appalling that Congress does not intend to pass a budget this year — something else they wish to sweep under the rug so as not to damage themselves further in advance of the midterm elections, perhaps. Outrageous spending and a lack of responsiveness to constituents’ concerns is a far more reasonable explanation for the poor prospects of Democrats this fall than President Obama losing the “message wars.” How about winning the competence war and going on a few less vacations?

On Meet the Press on Sunday, here is what Press Secretary Gibbs had to say:

“I think there’s no doubt there are enough seats in play that could cause Republicans to gain control. There’s no doubt about that. This will depend on strong campaigns by Democrats,” Gibbs said on Sunday.

By the next morning, Democratic strategists were fuming privately that he had handed Republicans a great fundraising and voter-motivation tool.

Gibbs and other White House officials have been backpedaling, in carefully measured steps, ever since.

Speaker Pelosi also complained that Obama favors the Senate and helps them in their fundraising efforts far more than he helps the House, which has shown great loyalty to him.

The Senate love fest may be coming to an end as well. Embattled Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid went on the record saying that President Obama is not “firm” or “foreceful enough” with his Republican opposition. This prompted the bellicose Ed Schultz of MSNBC to complain Reid just called the President a “wimp.” The “timing is horrible” says Shultz. No kidding:

Looks like Harry doesn’t feel the wind at his back, given that Sharron Angle is besting him in the polls in Nevada at the moment. Other historically “safe” Senate seats are in trouble as well. Fiorina is polling ahead of Boxer in CA for the first time. Even Russ Feingold’s seat is not quite safe.

Apparently, Ms. Pelosi and her cronies missed the memo on how this politics stuff works.

The President is going to do everything he can to save himself. If that means throwing Congress under the bus so he can have a Republican foil to do battle against, making more of his straw man arguments, then he will. If that helps in his re-election bid, that is Job One.

Did Nancy and Harry think when they threw Hillary under the bus, they were going to be rewarded for it?

These two are not the only Presidents-by-Proxy to find out they are dispensable.

According to CNN, when it comes to the passage of the new health care bill…

[Billy] Wharton, co-chair of the Socialist Party USA, sees no reason to celebrate. He’s seen people with bumper stickers and placards that call Obama a socialist, and he has a message for them: Obama isn’t a socialist. He’s not even a liberal.

“We didn’t see a great victory with the election of Barack Obama,” Wharton says, “and we certainly didn’t see our agenda move from the streets to the White House.”

Obama’s opponents have long described him as a socialist. But what do actual socialists think about Obama? Not much, says Wharton.

And here is where CNN shares a doozy and my second favorite line of the entire article. According to Mr. Wharton:

“He’s the president whose main goal is to protect the wealth of the richest 5 percent of Americans.”

Ding ding ding ding ding ding ding ding !!!! Bingo! You win the prize. Corporate bailouts. Crony capitalism. “Too big to fail policies” that encourage Wall Street thugs who have been reckless to continue said behavior knowing they will get bailed out when they fail again. A health insurance plan to benefit Big Insurance and Big Phrma, bailing out mis-managed car companies….

Mr. Obama is a corporatist.

One of his biggest economic advisors is Austan Goolsbee (um, the guy who wants to privatize Social Security). I said it when President Bush was trying to do the same thing – do you want some of these Wall Street ganeffs (crooks) managing your hard earned dough and playing Ponzi schemes with your retirement?

The following should be of interest:

[Wharton] and others say the assertion that Obama is a socialist is absurd.

“It makes no rational sense. It clearly means that people don’t understand what socialism is.”

Definitions of socialism vary, but most socialists believe workers and consumers who are affected by economic institutions should own or control them.

Not all socialists, though, want to confiscate personal property. Democratic Socialists are more interested in protecting ordinary people from unregulated capitalism through regulation and progressive taxation.

Some of the socialist agenda is already part of American life, according to Wharton and others.

Social Security, Medicare, unemployment benefits — all reflect socialistic values, says Van Gosse, an associate professor of history at Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster, Pennsylvania, who has researched socialist movements in the United States and Latin America.

The widely accepted notions of public education and Pell Grants for college students are socialistic in origin, Gosse says. They fit well with the socialistic premise that government should provide basic security from the cradle to the grave to all of its citizens, he says.

“We assert that education should not be left up to the private market — where those who can pay, get it and those who can’t, don’t get it,” Gosse says. “It’s a common good and in that sense it is a socialistic institution even if the U.S. remains a capitalist nation.”

Socialists are not happy with the recent 2,700 page health insurance reform bill…

They don’t applaud the passage of the recent health care bill either. They wanted a national “single-payer” health insurance plan with a government option. The bill that Obama championed didn’t have any of those features.

Wharton said the new health care bill only strengthens private health insurance companies. They get 32 million new customers and no incentive to change — something a socialist wouldn’t accept.

“Most of it was authored by the health care industry,” Wharton says. “I call it the corporate restructuring of health care.”

BINGO!! And in regard to The Obama administrations actions re the banks, just like Bush before him:

Other critics point to Obama’s Wall Street bailout — which actually had its roots in the Bush administration. Critics say it’s socialistic for government to assume control of private industry.

Frank Llewellyn, national director of the Democratic Socialists of America, says the bailout had nothing to do with socialism.

Llewellyn says a socialist leader would have at least nationalized some of the troubled banks.

“He gave them [the banks] too much with no strings attached,” Llewellyn says. “Banks that were too big to fail are bigger, and they can still fail.”

How about Obama’s bailout of the Detroit auto industry? During the bailout, the federal government assumed partial ownership of General Motors.

“It’s not socialism,” Llewellyn says. “The mere fact that the government owns something or has a stake in it, doesn’t make it socialist. If that was true, you would say that we have a socialist army. The government owns the army.”

Here’s where it gets interesting:

Defining socialism is complex, Llewellyn says, but it starts with a simple goal: Socialists want to introduce democratic features into the economy to reduce inequality.

The economy has “to be run for the overall benefit of the entire population, not for the benefits of a very few people.”

By that measure, Obama’s economic policies are not socialist, he says.

Many here at NoQuarter have long maintained that Presidents Obama and Bush are mirror images of each other. Mr. Llewellyn’s comments go some distance in making that point.

A tea party member had this to say in response:

“The role of government is to provide a safe environment to conduct business, not to take from one and give to the other,” says Quagliaroli, a financial planner who lives in Woodstock, Georgia.

Quagliaroli was not persuaded by the arguments of other socialist leaders who reject the idea that Obama is a socialist.

“He’s just not socialist enough for them.”

Quagliaroli says he doesn’t like socialism because it breeds mediocrity and encourages people to “live on the dole.” Capitalism “breeds excellence” because it encourages initiative, he says.

I have likewise heard other heretofore compassionate people becoming judgmental over the lifestyles of others, particularly if they are reckless, since we are now going to have to subsidize them. If “spreading the wealth acround” means I have lived by the rules my whole life and now have to bail out those who haven’t — no, I don’t like that either.

And now we come to my favorite line in the entire article – this ought to have heads exploding all over the country:

The argument over Obama’s ideology may rage on, but at least one socialist says another prominent politician ought to be inserted into the debate.

Llewellyn, the national director of the Democratic Socialists of America, says he was struck by one player in the 2008 presidential elections who displayed more socialistic leanings than Obama.

This candidate raised taxes on the big oil companies, and sent the revenue to the people.

If you want to learn something about spreading the wealth, Llewellyn says, don’t look to Obama.

“To be honest, the most socialist candidate in the 2008 election was Sarah Palin.”

Hmmm. Well, at least that gives the lie to lefties claiming Sarah Palin is some sort of reactionary.

I think the reason so many keep calling President Obama a socialist is that they don’t know how to term his political philosophy. Perhaps because the only one he seems to have is the one that is going to get him re-elected – namely putting money in the pockets of the groups who have the most dough to spend on his campaign.

His supporters didn’t want to admit it, but he got more money from Wall Street than any other candidate. Fannie and Freddie, Unions, Big Insurance, Big Phrma likewise helped put him over the top – burying all comers in an avalanche of money. His policies most seem to benefit them. Not us. Even the rumblings we are hearing about proposed regulatory reform in the banking industry leave me doubtful anything will be imposed that has real teeth. This health care plan was more or less written by insurance companies for their own benefit. How can we believe anything else that comes out of this administration is going to be for the benefit of those on the street?

Frankly, I’m not sure what name to give what is coming out of this White House but it sure seems to continue the idea that an elite few create policies that most benefit themselves, and we are told to sit down, shut up and take what’s left over.

What would you call it?

Democratic officeholders should be afraid.

Republican officeholders, too.

For many a year now, officeholders of both major parties have worked hard to earn the distrust of ordinary Americans. It appears that they finally have succeeded.

If only ordinary Americans hadn’t been so inattentive. If only ordinary Americans hadn’t been so trusting. If only ordinary Americans hadn’t been so damnably nice, the country would be in a better position to manage its finances today. [snip]

Better late than never, a lot of ordinary Americans are waking up to the sobering reality that there really is no one they can trust. Not Democrats. Not Republicans. Not government. Not corporations. And certainly not corporations in league with government.

The people who are angry today are more in tune with this nation’s founders than ordinary Americans have been in decades.

While there are those who make fun of a few tea partiers dressing up in costumes reminiscent of our founding fathers, those costumes are designed to make a point:

The United States has an intricate system of checks and balances, and a government structure based on a separation of powers, and a Bill of Rights that safeguards the rights of states and the rights of the people precisely because the greatest collection of political talent and philosophical insight ever assembled on this continent — and maybe anywhere on this planet — looked at the concept of government and said, “We need to make a really small cage for this thing, then be careful not to overfeed it.”

We seem to have lost the care-and- feeding instructions about a century ago. We let government out of its little cage and it has been consuming everything it can lay its paws on ever since. In the last 45 years, it has been on a real binge, and in the last year and a half, it has taken bigger bites than a lot of people thought possible.

Ordinary Americans who care about freedom are finally getting a clue and — horrors! — they’re hollering at members of Congress. That’s right: Nice, trusting, formerly inattentive Americans are getting in the faces of the political class and calling them names.

…If members of the political class are too tender to endure a little well-earned rudeness from the people whose hard-earned money they like to “spread around,” then they ought to get out of politics. Maybe their successors will find the voice of the people less irritating.

While O’Brien is correct in stating that this righteous anger needs to be expressed without violence, he also states that this administration and our media as taking to shutting down criticism with tactics of demonization (just like the administration before it):

Don’t doubt for a second that the left is hoping desperately for someone to step all the way out of line. They thought they had their man — and early news reports said they did — when Joseph Stack crashed his Piper Dakota into an IRS building in Texas.
As it turned out, Stack proved to be a Marx-quoting lefty — the wrong flavor of nut.

So the left has to settle for a little name-calling of its own: “ignorant,” “racist,” “homophobes,” “hooligans,” “extremists.” The list, as you know, goes on and on.

It’s bunk, but it’s the script.

Tea Party folks are just patriots worried, with good reason, about the future of the country they love. They’re vocal and they’re inspiringly unaffiliated.

They scare the hell out of both political parties, because they’ve embraced distrust.

The Democrats fear them because they see through the left’s empty promise of utopia in exchange for freedom. The Republicans fear them because they’re pushy and because they’re loyal to their principles rather than to a party.

They make everyone uncomfortable. That’s healthy.

While I’ve never been to a tea party protest, I got good and angry when the bailouts started at the end of 2008 and the pork laden non useful Stimulus package passed in 2009 and the bailouts of car companies that couldn’t run themselves properly happened, too. The 2700 page health care monstrosity, whose ugly details are now just coming to light, was the last straw.

I was taught to play by the rules only to discover my taxpayer dollars were used to bail out those using our investments as a giant ponzi scheme. And too many politicans who exempt themselves from the rules and policies we are expected to follow take pork for their districts as an inducement to continue to sell taxpayers down the river.

So crooks and liars are rewarded for their folly while the rest of us are told to pay the bill – and keep playing by the rules. That is but one reason for the groundswell of anger sweeping the country.

What are yours?

“This isn’t how responsible families do their budgets. When times are tough, you tighten your belts,” Obama said, according to a White House transcript of his appearance Tuesday at a high school in North Nashua, N.H.

“You don’t go buying a boat when you can barely pay your mortgage,” Obama said. “You don’t blow a bunch of cash on Vegas when you’re trying to save for college. You prioritize. You make tough choices.”

The comments quickly sparked a flurry of reaction from federal, state and local lawmakers in the Silver State, which had an unemployment rate of 13 percent in December.

Tough choices? Like sticking a bunch of pork in the stimulus bill? Like bailing out Wall Street and saying the heck with Main Street. Like holding back stimulus dollars till an election year so he can boost the Democrats’ prospects in the midterms while people have been losing homes and jobs, suffering horribly all through 2009? Those tough choices?

His preaching on the subject comes as a shock indeed considering this President in his first year has spent more than all other Presidents combined. He hosts half million dollars pizza parties, averaging a party every three days. He had the most expensive inauguration ever, clocking in at about $170 million, spent $6 million on a faux Grecian temple at the Convention and spent three quarters of a billion dollars to get the Presidency in this “no lose year” for Democrats. Do as I say, not as I do.

Anyone will tell you, modeling good behavior works a lot better than preaching. Something Mr. Obama might want to make note of, considering he has a bad habit of living beyond his means. It takes nerve to ask others to sacrifice when he and the First Lady spare no expense for themselves on the taxpayers’ dime. Why should we be surprised at his spending the taxpayers’ money so recklessly when his own past indicates the same pattern.

He bought a house he couldn’t afford with the help of Tony Rezko, then under indictment. Obama later said, “it was boneheaded” yet he feels quite comfortable telling other Americans the proper way to “tighten their belts.” When credit card companies wanted to charge usury rates, Obama did nothing to oppose them.

The President and First Lady had an opportunity to lead by example in the sacrifice department. Unfortunately, they have repeatedly demonstrated they are far more concerned with enjoying the perks and toys of office than tightening their own belts as a way to both inspire the American people and to show that they “feel our pain.”

“I’ll do everything I can to give him the boot,” Las Vegas Mayor Oscar Goodman said … adding that he was incensed when he heard about the comments and said he would no longer welcome the president here if he visits.

“This president is a real slow learner,” said Goodman, who is not affiliated with a political party.

Nevada’s economy has been hit hard with foreclosures, unemployment and bankruptcies during the past two years as consumers everywhere tighten leisure spending and companies spend less on meetings and conventions.

And when your own Senator Majority Leader, the much maligned Harry Reid – most likely the man who lit a fire under Obama to run in the first place – condemns your remarks, you know you’ve stuck your foot in it: Reid issued a statement:

“Reid to Obama: ‘Lay off Las Vegas’.

“The President needs to lay off Las Vegas and stop making it the poster child for where people shouldn’t be spending their money,” Reid said. “I would much rather tourists and business travelers spend their money in Las Vegas than spend it overseas.”

Obama’s reply was insipid at best:

“I was making the simple point that families use vacation dollars, not college tuition money, to have fun,” Obama said, according to the letter. “There is no place better to have fun than Vegas, one of our country’s great destinations.”

Sen. John Ensign, a Republican, complained that Obama “failed to grasp the weight that his words carry.”

Well, Ensign hits the nail on the head. How can this man be the POTUS and not understand that his every remark is tracked to within an inch of its life. If the President voices disapproval about a city – it’s revenues falter. How could he not know that?

Las Vegas’ Mayor Goodman concluded with this telling remark:

“Sometimes when he’s not using his monitors and reading what he says, he doesn’t think…”

The President doesn’t think? Is that the reason why Axelrod and Co. never want the president to go off script? Is Goodman implying that without his trusty TelePrompTer, POTUS’ handlers never know what is going to happen? Like Obama’s careless remark that “the Cambridge police acted stupidly” before he knew the facts of the case. That little nugget arguably went a long way toward costing the Democratic Party the MA Senate seat.

Goodman also said Obama has a “psychological hang-up” about Las Vegas. So I offer one of two theories about his remarks:

1. Perhaps his sensitive nature is still holding a grudge against Las Vegas because Hillary won the Nevada primary – forcing Obama to have to fight on for the nomination.

2. The “my uncle liberated Auschwitz” syndrome – he is just looking for the nearest convenient sound bite, accurate or not.

He figures no one is going to challenge him on the accuracy of his remarks or take him to task for them. Why wouldn’t he believe this? The media hasn’t bothered to do their jobs so far. It never occurs to him that his careless words – pulling the nearest example out of his, er, hat that he can find, can have serious repercussions to others – being that he is the President of the United States.

As Hillary Clinton once said, “you don’t need a President who looks down at you.”

Millions of Americans are hurting. They watched a man win a historic election, promising change only to see politics as usual and worse, a White House that is deaf, dumb and blind to their concerns. A spendthrift who tells everyone else how to sacrifice is as elitist as he is out of touch.

Someone needs to remind the President that when he mouths off, he is not an adjunct lecturer getting cute at a cocktail party, spouting some witty bon mot for the entertainment of his hangers on.

Words are not just words anymore. The President is being held accountable for them — if not by the media, then by the voters. It would be helpful if he held himself accountable as well.

Ironic that yesterday, NY Times columnist Charles Blow, certainly an Obama cheerleader from way back, penned a column entitled Obama’s to Fix, in which he cautions the President to stop blaming George Bush for the “mess” he inherited. Clearly, our President, far from undoing such a mess, is daily making a bigger one of his own. Mr. Blow begins with this ominous phrase:

What a difference a year makes.

In October 2008, the candidate Barack Obama delivered a major economic speech in Toledo, Ohio. In it he said: “Right now, we face an immediate economic emergency, and that requires urgent action. We can’t wait to help workers and families and communities who are struggling right now — who don’t know if their job or their retirement will be there tomorrow; who don’t know if next week’s paycheck will cover this month’s bills. … We need to pass an economic rescue plan for the middle-class, and we need to do it not five years from now, not next year, we need to do it right now.

“So today I’m proposing a number of steps that we should take immediately to stabilize our financial system, provide relief to families and communities and help struggling homeowners. It’s a plan that begins with one word that’s on everybody’s mind, and it’s easy to spell: J-O-B-S.”

“Right now,” “immediate economic emergency,” “requires urgent action,” “can’t wait.” Wow! He gave the impression that job creation would be his top priority, that action would be swift and effective, that his solutions would not only stanch the hemorrhaging, but reverse the trend.

He has not made jobs his top priority. This health care debacle, bailing out Wall Street, getting into the car business and generally putting money into the pockets of everyone except those who need it have all taken priority over putting Americans back to work. And, no, putting an extra $13 a week into people’s paychecks is not going to do the trick when as Mr. Blow points out the new official labor statistics have us at 10.2 unemployment, which is an increase of “more than 50 percent from the time Obama gave that speech.”

“(By the way, the underemployment rate, which includes part-time workers who want to work full time and those who’ve given up searching, is a staggering 17.5 percent.)”

I am still at a loss to understand why there was such a great urgency to pass health care legislation that is not supposed to go into effect for more than three years. Someone on another blog made the observation that Obama and Pelosi et al are using the economic crisis and joblessness as a weapon to pass their agenda. As people are panicked at losing their jobs and their healthcare, they are more likely to look to government to bail them out – and more amenable. As Rahm Emanuel said, “never waste a good crisis.” What better time to ram this through. Mr. Blow continues:

Job creation has dropped from top priority to one of many, and President Obama has been remanded to pandering for patience and offering excuses. On the one hand, he argues the tortured rationale that there is good news in the awful numbers: Things are still getting worse but at a slower pace. On the other, he incessantly reminds us that he inherited the crisis. The implication: Don’t blame me, blame Bush.

But this president can’t keep deflecting to the last one. Pain is presently felt. The crisis that took form on Bush’s watch is being experienced on Obama’s. Fair or not, finger-pointing is not effective policy.

This is now Obama’s crisis, and it carries political consequences. During Tuesday’s gubernatorial races in New Jersey and Virginia, nearly 9 in 10 voters said that they were worried about the direction of the nation’s economy in the next year. And the majority of those who held that view voted for the Republican candidates. This could portend a flashback to 1994.

It isn’t President Obama’s fault that he inherited this mess, but it is his to fix, and he must make haste. To paraphrase his Toledo prelection: you need to do it not five years from now, not next year, you need to do it right now. J-O-B-S.

There were many options to put people back to work this year if that was really the priority. Clearly it was not. This President spent almost a billion dollars to get his job. I don’t want to hear complaints now. Obviously, he inherited a mess, which he has made worse with reckless spending. No one expects him to fix everything in the space of a year, but I thought his “good judgment” meant he knew how to prioritize. We need leadership and part of that involves sacrificing one’s ego to help those who need it most. That is far more important than pushing legislation just for the purpose of putting a check mark next to one’s name. You don’t not spend billions, even trillions, you don’t have at a time like this. Since this bunch so miscalculated on their $787 billion stimulus package, I am not inclined to trust them now by handing over 1/6 of the economy to their stewardship.

It is interesting that Mr. Blow, who played the race card on Mr. Obama’s behalf last year, is now joining the ever increasing number of his pundit supporters who are having problems with his endless campaigning, blaming and wrongheaded focus.

As to the health care debate, I called my Congressman’s office Friday morning to complain about the bill and his assistant debated the merits with me. At least she took the time to do so. It was a shame she was wrong on the facts. I told her to go back and read the thing. Now we have a 2,000 page beast that the Senate must contend with and we are told it will never pass in its current form. So why the rush? Why wouldn’t this Administration be in the same kind of rush to help get people back to work?

There are 237 millionaires in Congress. Perhaps that explains why they have difficulty relating to the urgent need to put millions of Americans back of work, instead manufacturing an urgent need to pass labrynthian legislation for the mere purpose of saying “Mission Accomplished.”

Hmm. Where have we heard that phrase before?

The American Idol president is running his own reality show and we are picking up the tab. Mr. Obama seems to think that he and his wife are the most fascinating part of the American narrative. Last Friday, the IOC clarified the butter for the Obamas. In the past months, we have published many articles reporting on Kool Aid drinkers who have lifted their heads from the pink trough, dazed and confused, wondering where the “Change” is. The list is long: Peggy Noonan, Frank Rich, Susan Estrich, Andrew Sullivan, Camille Paglia, Robert Reich. Feel free to add your own. Today I add three more to that growing list.

First WaPo’s Richard Cohen complains Obama Doesn’t Seem Ready to Lead:

Barack Obama’s trip to Copenhagen to pitch Chicago for the Olympics would have been a dumb move whatever the outcome. But as it turned out (an airy dismissal would not be an unfair description), it poses some questions about his presidency that are way more important than the proper venue for synchronized swimming. The first, and to my mind most important, is whether Obama knows who he is.

This business of self-knowledge is no minor issue. It bears greatly on the single most crucial issue facing this young and untested president: Afghanistan. Already, we have his choice for Afghanistan commander, Gen. Stanley A. McChrystal, taking the measure of his commander in chief and publicly telling him what to do. This MacArthuresque star turn called for a Trumanesque response, but Obama offered nothing of the kind. Instead, he used McChrystal as a prop, adding a bit of four-star gravitas to that silly trip to Copenhagen by having the general meet with him there.

Mr. Cohen is blaming Gen. McChrystal for someone else leaking his report to the President. The more important point is, as Gen. Wes Clark or anyone else who’s actually been in this position will tell you (and as he did say in an interview this weekend), you’d better listen to your commanders on the ground. Cohen is right that the 25 minute meeting with McChrystal on Friday was merely a photo op. He’s still deliberating. How many more months of ‘deliberating” are required while our soldiers are dying in Afghanistan?

This is the president we now have: He inspires lots of affection but not a lot of awe. It is the latter, though, that matters most in international affairs, where the greatest and most gut-wrenching tests await Obama. If he remains consistent to his own rhetoric of just last August, he will send more troops to Afghanistan and more of them will die. “This is not a war of choice,” he said. “This is a war of necessity. Those who attacked America on 9/11 are plotting to do so again. If left unchecked, the Taliban insurgency will mean an even larger safe haven from which al-Qaeda would plot to kill more Americans.”

President Obama has the disastrous example of Iraq where Bush’s Generals told him from the outset that an overwhelming force was needed. They did not get it. You saw the result. Obama himself admitted that the belated 2007 surge was wildly successful. How much more evidence does he need? Define the mission, and either send the forces in to get the job done or pull all our men and women out of there. Choose. Lead. That’s the job description. Date night I don’t care about. Dog walking I don’t care about.

Cohen concludes:

But the ultimate in realism is for the president to gauge himself and who he is: Does he have the stomach and commitment for what is likely to be an unpopular war? Will he send additional troops, but hedge by not sending enough — so that the dying will be in vain? What does he believe, and will he ask Americans to die for it? Only he knows the answers to these questions. But based on his zigzagging so far and the suggestion from the Copenhagen trip that the somber seriousness of the presidency has yet to sink in, we have reason to wonder.

Has the seriousness of the presidency sunk in? Now there’s a question.

You may be surprised to note that NY Times columnist Bob Herbert is wondering the same thing. A huge cheerleader for Obama, Herbert cried racism and even saw phallic symbols in the leaning tower of Pisa in a misguided attempt to defend his chosen hero last year. Now he wonders Does Obama Get It? Well, Mr. Herbert, don’t feel bad. This question has been keeping me up nights, too. He states:

The big question on the domestic front right now is whether President Obama understands the gravity of the employment crisis facing the country. Does he get it? The signals coming out of the White House have not been encouraging.

Clearly Mr. Herbert, if you have to ask, then Obama does not understand the gravity of the situation. Where is his good judgment? How can one not understand 9.8 unemployment – in reality it is a much higher number when one includes Americans out of work for so long they have fallen off the rolls.

The Beltway crowd and the Einsteins of high finance who never saw this economic collapse coming are now telling us with their usual breezy arrogance that the Great Recession is probably over. Their focus, of course, is on data, abstractions like the gross domestic product, not the continued suffering of living, breathing human beings struggling with the nightmare of joblessness.

Even Mr. Obama, in an interview with The Times, gave short shrift to the idea of an additional economic stimulus package, telling John Harwood a few weeks ago that the economy had likely turned a corner. “As you know,” the president said, “jobs tend to be a lagging indicator; they come last.”

The view of most American families is somewhat less blasé. …

Nearly one in four American families has suffered a job loss over the past year, according to a survey released by the Economic Policy Institute. Nearly 1 in 10 Americans is officially unemployed, and the real-world jobless rate is worse.

It is a nightmare. No one is blasé when they are worried how they are going to feed their families. What about the porkulus package? Is this administration waiting to release most of the funds in 2010 to help them at the polls? If that is the case, shame on them.

Why should Obama understand when he isn’t spending his own money? Half million dollar pizza parties, an obscene amount spent on the inauguration and several million on this reckless Copenhagen junket show a frightening disconnect between Obama’s priorities and his fiduciary responsibility to the American people. Herbert continues:

The Obama administration seems hamstrung by the unemployment crisis. No big ideas have emerged. No dramatically creative initiatives. While devoting enormous amounts of energy to health care, and trying now to decide what to do about Afghanistan, the president has not even conveyed the sense of urgency that the crisis in employment warrants.

If that does not change, these staggering levels of joblessness have the potential to cripple not just the well-being of millions of American families, but any real prospects for sustained economic recovery and the political prospects of the president as well. An unemployed electorate is an unhappy electorate.

Mr. Herbert, they are already crippled, but instead of addressing the urgency of the economy and Afghanistan head on, we get what George Will calls The Obamas’ Narcissism on Display. Speaking of Mr. and Mrs. Obama’s speeches before the IOC last week,

…Their separate speeches to the International Olympic Committee were so dreadful, and in such a characteristic way, that they might be symptomatic of something that has serious implications for American governance.

Both Obamas gave heartfelt speeches about … themselves. Although the working of the committee’s mind is murky, it could reasonably have rejected Chicago’s bid for the 2016 games on aesthetic grounds — unless narcissism has suddenly become an Olympic sport.

George Will suggested that since the Obamas used so many “I” and “me” references in their speeches, Obama’s genius speechwriters (Favreau et al) should have substituted the words I and me with “sauerkraut” to underscore the ‘antic nature of their excessive appearances.’ Someone needs to tell the Obamas that what is compelling about America is all Americans – all colors of the rainbow, all states, all social strata – together. All of us. Not just the two of them. And all of us are hurting out here. Our soldiers are hurting, too.

Will also points to Obama’s excessive use of cliché:

“At this defining moment,” a moment “when the fate of each nation is inextricably linked to the fate of all nations” in “this ever-shrinking world,” he aspires to “forge new partnerships with the nations and the peoples of the world.”
…
Does our Cicero even glance at his speeches before reading them in public?

All this is indicative of a man not connected to his words or not caring enough about either his audience or the subject at hand to come up with anything better than patented brand phrases that some focus group told him “resonate” with the public.

Our soldiers and our economy need a coherent plan. Now. He has had ample time to figure this out, as has Congress. Too much energy is focused on infighting for a health care plan that is such an incoherent monstrosity that they should trash it and start over. This is not even supposed to take effect until 2013, after the next election. Hmmm I wonder why. All things considered, that leaves health care the least urgent issue of the three.

On Afghanistan and the economy, pressing matters where lives, jobs and homes are on the line – where is the president? Will concludes:

Unhappy will be a president whose defining adjective is “vain.”

In keeping with the vanity of this man’s administration, we also see that nothing President Obama does is his own fault. This is the job he wanted. And a majority of the electorate voted him in to do it. What is he waiting for? There is no one else to blame if he hems and haws so long that Afghanistan is lost. There is no one else to blame if he insists on focusing on parts of an agenda that are not helping put the American people back to work. This is his presidency now. So I’ll ask again.

Mr. President, why did you want this job?

H/T to Hot Air for this video. It is very short, so please stay with it.

Obama attempts to reassure “folks” at a town hall that health care reform does not mean long lines, nor does it mean the private insurers will be run out of business. How does he do it? He states that Fed Ex and UPS are still doing fine – it’s the post office that’s having problems.

Um. Isn’t the post office government run?

Does his “example” reassure you? Inquiring minds want to know.

Chat away.

Clearly Mr. Van Dyk was a huge fan of this President, thought his campaign “superb” and appreciated his promises of “reaching across party and ideological lines to get the public’s business done.” Van Dyk opines:

“You displayed an intellect and sense of cool that made us think you would weigh decisions carefully and view advisers’ proposals with skepticism.”

You know what I get from that phrase? Since the President acted “cool,” some mighty educated people actually believed this to be more than just a pose on his part. Not unlike Madonna’s use of “Voguing” back in the day. Now perhaps they begin to see that a pose has neither to do with governing nor an ability to adapt to the changing realities on the ground.

At that point, Mr. Van Dyk goes off the rails and we see that his blanket approval has come to an end:

The first warning signals for me came with your acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention. In it, you stressed domestic initiatives that clearly were nonstarters in the already shrinking economy.

He then complains of Obama stocking his White House with “Clinton administration retreads who had learned their trade in the never-ending-campaign culture of the Clinton years.” Again, blame Clinton. But who did Mr. Van Dyk think this man was going to hire? He faults Obama for his “reliance on these Clinton holdovers.”

Your chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, defined your early strategy by stating that the financial and economic crises presented an “opportunity” to jam through unrelated legislation. To many of us, the remark was cynical and wrong-headed.

The crises did not represent an opportunity. They presented an obligation to do one thing: Return our financial system and our economy to good health.

Does Van Dyk assume any Democratic president would have been this reckless? Hillary Clinton had different health care proposals, different proposals for helping homeowners in this crisis and a much better understanding of the economy. None of her ideas are being utilized, I’m afraid. She just may have exhibited the good sense Mr. Van Dyk longs for and put the financial floor back under us before attempting a more drastic change. But we’ll never know…

Van Dyk discusses Mr. Obama being unfairly compared to FDR & LBJ. Discussing President Johnson’s “Great Society legislation”…

…at every stage, congressional leaders of both political parties and financial, business, labor and other private-sector leaders were consulted. Johnson wanted to assure that his legislation was substantively sound and could get consensus support in the Congress and the country.

Your strategy, by contrast, has been to advocate forcefully for health-care and energy reform but to leave the details to Democratic congressional committee chairs. You did the same thing with your initial $787 billion stimulus package. Now, you’re stuck with a plan that provides little stimulus until 2010. A president should never cede control of his main agenda to others.

President Obama is in over his head, so of course he “outsourced.” Why is this gentleman surprised? Mr. Van Dyk willfully ignores the fact that the biggest culprit here is not a “Clinton retread,” but the Queen Bee herself, Speaker Nancy Pelosi. She crafted the stimulus package behind closed doors and the President willingly allowed her this control. Perhaps that was his devil’s bargain for her help in kicking the ladder out from under Hillary. Republicans were not the only ones to be shut out of the crafting of the Stimulus package. Many Democrats were as well. Van Dyk continues:

This tactic has already had negative consequences. Frightened by the prospective costs of your health-care and energy plans — not to mention the bailouts of the financial and auto industries — independent voters who supported you in 2008 are falling away. FDR and LBJ, only two years after their 1932 and 1964 victories, saw their parties lose congressional seats even though their personal popularity remained stable. The party out of power traditionally gains seats in off-year elections, and 2010 is unlikely to be an exception.

He then offers up a prescription for a fix:

- Cut back both your proposals and expectations. You made promises about jobs that would be “created and saved” by the stimulus package. Those promises have not held up. You continue to engage in hyperbole by claiming that your health-care and energy plans will save tax dollars. Congressional Budget Office analysis indicates otherwise.

It’s time to re-examine these initiatives. Could your health plan be scaled back to catastrophic coverage for all — badly needed by most families, but quite affordable if deductibles are set at the right levels? Should the Rube Goldbergian cap-and-trade proposals be replaced with a simple carbon tax, with proceeds to be allocated to alternative-fuels development?

The evolving health and cap-and-trade bills are loaded with costly provisions designed to gain support from congressional leaders and special-interest constituencies. In short, they have become an expensive mess. This legislation will not clear Congress by the August recess, as you have requested, and could be stalled for the remainder of 2009. Settle for incremental change: Do not press Democratic legislators to vote for something they fear will destroy them in 2010.

- Talk less and pick your spots.

Applause and adulation are gratifying. But the more you talk, the less weight your words will hold. Let voters see you at your desk, conferring with serious people about serious matters. When you do choose to talk, people will understand that it’s important and they should listen.

“Let voters see you at your desk!” Doing some “work.” Great ideas!

- Conform your 2009 politics to your 2008 statements. During your campaign, you called for bipartisanship and bridge-building. You promised to reduce the influence of single-issue and single-interest groups in the policy process. Yet, in your public statements, you keep using President Bush as a scapegoat.

You have ceded content of your principal proposals to Democratic congressional leaders who in large part have yielded to special-interest constituencies and excluded Republican leaders from policy formulation. This certainly was the case with the stimulus plan. It has been the case with health and energy legislation, with the notable exception of Sen. Max Baucus’s attempt in the Senate Finance Committee to develop genuinely bipartisan legislation.

He concludes by telling Obama

“You have an enormous reservoir of goodwill among Americans of all persuasions. They want you to succeed. Level with them and trim your proposals to what is practical in the current environment.”

But ironically, it is Mr. Van Dyk’s closing statement with which I most take issue:

You had things right in 2008. Take a timeout. Get back to yourself. Make a fresh start.

He did not have things “right” in 2008 because there is no “self” to ‘get back to’. His campaign was always “words, just words.”

While I graduated college with high honors, I am no genius, yet I figured this out from my living room couch back in January of 2008. I watched this man at a debate and his “performance” told me everything I needed to know. I then looked at his voting record and the corporate interests with whom he surrounds himself, his addiction to pretty sound bytes and an over reliance on canned speeches rather than a resume that indicated he had worked even on a smaller level to achieve his stated goals. His current proposals are loaded with top heavy payback for special interests that arguably got him elected in the first place. Wall Street has gotten bailed out. Not Main Street. He lives in support of an oligarchy, like his immediate predecessor. If these are true Democratic principles, its the first I’ve heard of it.

The obscene amount of money spent on his inauguration, expensive “dates” and pizza parties and his hiring not less than 30 “czars” all of whom require staff and total salaries in the millions are more accurate indicators of the man than any of his campaign rhetoric.

Like Obama’s other supporters, perhaps Mr. Van Dyk has yet to understand that speeches will never equal governing ability. He too, blamed the Clintons for being “polarizing” as Bush was, but how true is his claim? Clinton passed true bi-partisan legislation. He had to, as he was working with a Republican Congress for 6 of his 8 years and did very well in that regard. But in his case, he also had deep knowledge of the economy and a willingness to reach across the aisle and conform to the existing reality. He certainly left the country in better shape than he found it.

President Obama, by contrast is the “salesman in chief.” That is what the DNC wanted. How is he supposed to pull us back to “reality” with his proposals when he clearly did not have these reasoned intentions in the first place, or a true understanding of how to get us there?

Apparently, Mr. Van Dyk has yet to travel the last mile in his awakening.

There is no shortage of threats to our economy. America’s unemployment rate recently hit its highest mark in more than 25 years and is expected to continue climbing. Worries are widespread that even when the economy finally rebounds, the recovery won’t bring jobs. Our nation’s debt is unsustainable, and the federal government’s reach into the private sector is unprecedented.

Unfortunately, many in the national media would rather focus on the personality-driven political gossip of the day than on the gravity of these challenges. So, at risk of disappointing the chattering class, let me make clear what is foremost on my mind and where my focus will be:
I am deeply concerned about President Obama’s cap-and-trade energy plan, and I believe it is an enormous threat to our economy. It would undermine our recovery over the short term and would inflict permanent damage.

Palin points that “American prosperity has always been driven by the steady supply of abundant, affordable energy”…

There is no denying that as the world becomes more industrialized, we need to reform our energy policy and become less dependent on foreign energy sources. But the answer doesn’t lie in making energy scarcer and more expensive! Those who understand the issue know we can meet our energy needs and environmental challenges without destroying America’s economy.

As with everything the Obama Administration is doing, cap and trade also employs the ram-rod technique of shoving legislation down the gullet before anyone has had a chance to give it a second thought. Palin then makes a point I’m sure Obama would rather she gloss over:

Job losses are so certain under this new cap-and-tax plan that it includes a provision accommodating newly unemployed workers from the resulting dried-up energy sector, to the tune of $4.2 billion over eight years. So much for creating jobs.

In addition to immediately increasing unemployment in the energy sector, even more American jobs will be threatened by the rising cost of doing business under the cap-and-tax plan. For example, the cost of farming will certainly increase, driving down farm incomes while driving up grocery prices. The costs of manufacturing, warehousing and transportation will also increase.

The ironic beauty in this plan? Soon, even the most ardent liberal will understand supply-side economics.

The Americans hit hardest will be those already struggling to make ends meet. As the president eloquently puts it, their electricity bills will “necessarily skyrocket.” So much for not raising taxes on anyone making less than $250,000 a year.

Even Warren Buffett, an ardent Obama supporter, admitted that under the cap-and-tax scheme, “poor people are going to pay a lot more for electricity.”

Governor Palin urges us to move in a new direction and states we can achieve energy independence if we:

…responsibly tap the resources that God created right underfoot on American soil. Just as important, we have more desire and ability to protect the environment than any foreign nation from which we purchase energy today.

In Alaska, we are progressing on the largest private-sector energy project in history. Our 3,000-mile natural gas pipeline will transport hundreds of trillions of cubic feet of our clean natural gas to hungry markets across America. We can safely drill for U.S. oil offshore and in a tiny, 2,000-acre corner of the Arctic National Wildlife Refuge if ever given the go-ahead by Washington bureaucrats.

Of course, Alaska is not the sole source of American energy. Many states have abundant coal, whose technology is continuously making it into a cleaner energy source. Westerners literally sit on mountains of oil and gas, and every state can consider the possibility of nuclear energy.

Whether one agrees with her or not, one thing Governor Palin can speak to with authority is energy, given her service at the Oil & Gas Commission:

We have an important choice to make. Do we want to control our energy supply and its environmental impact? Or, do we want to outsource it to China, Russia and Saudi Arabia? Make no mistake: President Obama’s plan will result in the latter.

For so many reasons, we can’t afford to kill responsible domestic energy production or clobber every American consumer with higher prices.

Can America produce more of its own energy through strategic investments that protect the environment, revive our economy and secure our nation?

Yes, we can. Just not with Barack Obama’s energy cap-and-tax plan.

Loved the “Yes, we can” reference. What is your reaction to her position? I do not pretend to know that right answer here, but certainly she raises issues worth discussing.

Everyone else out there is having quite a big reaction. In a few hours, her op-ed in WaPo has attracted over 3,000 comments. All over the blogosphere and on news sites, people are reacting and as usual, Governor Palin is a lightning rod for both love and hate. HuffPo, typically, cannot kill the message, because she does have a point, so they shoot the messenger, claiming she is “too stupid” to have possibly written this piece. I thought the piece was pretty coherent myself, and yeah, I’m sure she wrote it. By the way, did I mention that I despise elitists. You can her article it in its entirety here.

Further, since the surprise announcement of her resignation on July 3rd, Palin has raised over $200,000 for her PAC, in addition to over $700,000 raised in the five months since its formation. CBS just put out a poll saying 65% of those asked think Palin would not make a good president and most pundits left and right are harping about the fact that her political career is effectively over. Wishful thinking, perhaps. I have no idea what Palin’s actions will be or what her political career will look like going forward, but one thing is assured — as long as these ridiculous attacks continue, her following will grow and she will get plenty of free press that she may use to her advantage.

As for the “chattering class,” as Palin calls them, I can only say, gee fellas, that’s an awful lot of copy to devote to someone with nothing to say, no platform to say it, no following and no hope of making a dent. Evah.

Somebody seems awfully scared of this lady.

Just sayin’.

Colin Powell, one of President Obama’s most prominent Republican supporters, expressed concern Friday that the president’s ambitious blitz of costly initiatives may be enlarging the size of government and the federal debt too much.

“I’m concerned at the number of programs that are being presented, the bills associated with these programs and the additional government that will be needed to execute them,”

Um, now he’s concerned?

During the campaign, President Obama made a plethora of pie in the sky promises. While he has certainly abandoned the left in cuddling up to President Bush’s lack of transparency, signing statements and the like, he has certainly trumped the Bush Administration in terms of spending ridiculous amounts of money, particularly bailing out Wall Street before Main Street. While Mr. Powell noted that

‘health care reform and many of Mr. Obama’s other initiatives are “important” to Americans…’ “one of the cautions that has to be given to the president — and I’ve talked to some of his people about this — is that you can’t have so many things on the table that you can’t absorb it all.” …”And we can’t pay for it all…”

Mr. Powell’s comments represent the growing concern that began with hard-line fiscal conservatives but is now spreading to moderates about the rate of government spending and debt under President Obama, and the long-term impact on the country’s fiscal sustainability and national security.

The national debt stands currently at $11.5 trillion and the deficit for the current fiscal year is projected to be close to $2 trillion.

Mr. Powell expressed alarm at “budgets that are running into the multi-trillions of dollars” and “a huge, huge national debt that, if we don’t pay for in our lifetime, our kids and grandkids and great-grandchildren will have to pay for it.”

He’s not alone in expressing alarm. I am very curious as to why he is making these statements now…

“So, I think the president, as he moves forward with his initiatives, has to start really taking a very, very hard look at what the cost of all this is. And, how much additional bureaucracy [will] be needed to make all of this happen?” Mr. Powell said.

Mr. Powell also noted that he does “stay in touch” with the Obama Administration, particularly recently.

“The federal government has become too large and too intrusive in our lives,” Mr. Powell said then. “We can no longer afford solutions to our problems that result in more entitlements, higher taxes to pay for them, more bureaucracy to run them, and fewer results to show for it.”

Mr. Powell said that now that he still believes what he said then, but that he would put it in different terms now.

“I don’t like slogans anymore like ‘limited government.’ That’s not the right answer. The right answer is, give me a government that works,” he said. “Keep it as small as possible. Keep the tax burden on the American people as small as possible, but at the same time, have government that is solving the problems of the people.”

Gee, is Mr. Powell planning his own campaign sometime in the future? Sounds like some sound advice and some pretty good campaign slogans to the bargain. It’s too bad he didn’t give President Obama that advice back when he was a candidate last fall.

How odd the Mr. Powell chose to endorse the gentleman anyway without first stopping for a moment to listen to all Obama’s campaign promises and looking carefully at the price tag. As American Girl in Italy noted in her excellent article about President Obama’s reversals on health care, he is now looking at adopting some of the very proposals he vilified Senator McCain for suggesting last year. Guess he’s finally been looking at the price tag, too – and the sticker shock is mighty big indeed.

With all due respect to General Powell, I really find it irritating that he is continually reversing himself in order to rescue his reputation. Perhaps he felt his good name and many honorable years of service were somewhat tarnished by making the case to go to war with Iraq. Who knows if his decision to endorse Mr. Obama was part of a mea culpa in that regard. Now that VP Biden acknowledged that the stimulus is sort of a bust and that their team underestimated our economy’s problems, Colin Powell is distancing himself from the President with these statements?

Gosh, I sure wish he would make up his mind.

[Scheiner] worries about whether the health care legislation currently making its way through Congress will actually do any good, particularly for doctors like himself who practice general medicine. “I’m not sure [Obama] really understands what we face in primary care.”

…Looking at Obama’s team of health advisors, Scheiner doesn’t see anyone who’s actually in the trenches. “I have a suspicion they pick people from the top echelon of medicine, people who write about it but haven’t been struggling in it,” he says.

Scheiner is critical of Obama’s pick for Health and Human Services secretary–Kansas Gov. Kathleen Sebelius, who used to work as the chief lobbyist for her state’s trial lawyers association.

Odd that President Obama would choose to throw Howard Dean under the bus and not give him the HHS appointment. It also seems SoS Clinton is not being consulted here. With her earlier efforts and deep dedication to this issue and her latest proposals, I’m sure she has much insight to offer.

“He doesn’t see all the pain, it’s so tragic out here,” [Scheiner] says. “Obama’s wonderful, but on this one I’m not sure if he’s getting the right input.”

But this is typically the issue. “Experts” are assigned to fix the problem without a clear understanding of what it is. Scheiner recommends

…”Medicare for all,” a single-payer system where the government would cover everyone and pay for it by cutting out waste in the system. “A neurosurgeon gets paid $20,000 for cutting into the neck of my patient. Have him get paid $1 million a year instead of $2 million or $3 million. He won’t starve.”

Scheiner thinks that Obama’s “public plan” reform doesn’t go far enough. He supports the idea of that option for people who don’t like or can’t afford their HMO. But he worries that it will be watered down or not happen at all. “It’s nonsense that the private insurance companies need to be protected,” he says. “Why? Because they’ve done such a good job?”

He thinks that Americans have been scared into believing that they will lose the coverage they already have if a public plan is created. And he worries that nobody cares about the 50 million uninsured. “I have people who have lost their jobs and come to me and I give them drug samples,” he says.

Scheiner says he thinks that Obama probably sees the virtues of a single-payer system but has decided it would be politically impossible to create one.

Well, that’s where the dig your heels in and fight part comes in. As much as I want health care reform, once again I get the sense that we are rushing into something without having thought through the options properly. The President as already worried about re-election and wants to get his “agenda” passed as quickly as possible, but during this frightening economic time, it would seem that building a better floor under us would build confidence not only in our economy but in the President’s leadership abilities and might make his “impossible fight” a little more possible down the road.

Reid Cherlin, an assistant White House press secretary who covers health issues, wrote in an e-mailed statement, “The President has been clear that while a single-payer system may work in some countries, it makes the most sense for us to build on what works in the system we have and to fix what’s broken.

“He would certainly agree that there’s too much waste in the system–where families, businesses and governments pay too much for too little,” he added, “and that’s why he’s committed not just to expanding coverage but to reforming the health system to provide high-quality care at a lower cost to more Americans.”

“I once briefly talked to him about malpractice, and he took the lawyers’ position,” [Scheiner] says.

Obama reiterated his opposition to caps on medical malpractice before the AMA this week.

Scheiner, like most others in his profession, thinks that it should be harder to sue doctors and that awards should be capped. He says that he and other doctors must order too many tests and imaging studies just to avoid being sued.

The article further states that Scheiner, a graduate of Princeton who got his start at Columbia University’s College of Physicians and Surgeons, had “watched his income decline over the years to what he calculated to be $22 an hour ($2,100 every two weeks after withholding for taxes, health insurance and malpractice insurance.)”

Scheiner thinks that any health reform should involve paying primary-care doctors better so they don’t have to rush through appointments to make ends meet. He says that the medical students he encounters are no longer even taught how to do a patient history and physical exam. Patients get imaging studies and lab work instead of actual work-ups. “It’s like in Star Trek where Bones had the thing he would wave up and down. They don’t even talk to patients,” he says.

In an interview with Reuters today, Senator John McCain commented:

Efforts to overhaul America’s costly healthcare system need to begin anew after the non-partisan Congressional Budget Office said a draft bill would cost $1 trillion and insure only 16 million of the 46 million uninsured people, McCain said.

“They just took a body blow,” he said of Obama’s Democrats. “Whether they recover from it or not, we will probably know in the next few days.”

McCain had some stark advice to Democrats writing the legislation: “I think that they should start over.”

Further a PEW research study published on June 18th had this to say:

As health care reform legislation moves forward in Washington, the political environment is somewhat different than the last time a major overhaul of the health care system was attempted sixteen years ago. In early 1993 the sense of a health care crisis was far more widespread than it is today – a 55% majority in 1993 said they felt the health care system needed to be “completely rebuilt” compared with 41% today. Health care costs were also a broader problem in 1993 – 63% of Americans said paying for the cost of a major illness was a “major problem” for them, compared with 48% currently.

The issue of limiting overall health care spending is also more prominent in 2009 than it was in 1993. Somewhat fewer today say the country spends “too little” on health care, and a larger share believe that limiting the overall growth in health care costs is a higher priority than expanding coverage. But overall, public support for guaranteed access to medical care for all Americans remains widespread.

I find this rather odd, with health care costs spiraling out of control and so many Americans without coverage. Here is an overview of the study’s findings: I encourage you to read the entire article here.

On health care spending:
Relatively few Americans believe the country as a whole is spending the right amount on health care at this point, but there is no consensus on what the problem is. Just as many Americans say we are spending too much on health care (38%) as too little (40%).

Most Back Overhaul; Fewer Than in 1993 See Crisis
Most Americans believe that the nation’s health care system is in need of substantial changes. Four-in-ten (41%) say the health care system needs to be completely rebuilt, while 30% think it needs fundamental changes. About one-in-four (24%) believe that the health care system works pretty well and needs only minor changes.

Health Reform Priorities
Most Americans favor ensuring health coverage to all Americans, and most also say it is very important to limit the overall annual increase in health care costs. Neither of these objectives, however, receives as overwhelming support as they did in early 1993. When Americans are asked to prioritize between these two goals, most continue to say that expanding health insurance to all is the more important goal. But the share who rate costs as the more important concern is nearly double what it was in 1993.

The public’s overall support for expanding health insurance to cover all Americans remains widespread, though more sharply partisan than in 1993.

And Fewer See Cost of Care as Major Problem than was thecase in 1993.

Any health care reform is going to be a huge fight. Both sides are already digging in their heels and I sincerely hope anyone with a reasonable proposal to bring to the table will be heard. It would be disastrous for this administration to push through health care reform in much the same way they did the Stimulus package earlier this year.

I appreciate Dr Scheiner’s comments as I understand how painful it is when those who are actually going to be on the receiving end of the government’s overhaul are not getting enough consultation on the matter. He’s offering a physician’s point of view. I’d certainly like to hear from others “on the ground.”

Where do you fall in the debate on this one? Your insights would be greatly appreciated.

The irony of the Prez spending his day at a Town Hall Meeting in Missouri (after a quick trip on Air Force One, of course) while the CDC has just confirmed the first death in the US of Swine Flu cannot be overlooked. Why wouldn’t his slipping poll ratings be the first thing on his mind? Why should the Prez be concerned that the first death is not even an American, but a Mexican that “travelled” here to visit family? His response to this is starting to resemble that of Paris Hilton. It’s not as if we should be surprised – he is a celebrity, after all. Besides, with the newly sworn in Kathleen Sebelius on watch, we can be assured no child will be born with H1N1.

Even the most committed Obamabot must admit that these first 100 days have been anything but the glorious ascension of The One that was predicted just six months ago. His European Victory tour was hardly that. We still have combat troops on the ground in Iraq and Afghanistan and Pakistan is on shakier ground every day. Our Secretary of State has been sent to China to grovel for money and the Middle East to grovel for time and tolerance. Our Attorney General is jet setting around the globe begging for sanctuary for the terrorists the admin has promised to release next year – well, those we don’t want to keep ourselves. And while the stock market bounces up and down regularly, GDP numbers this AM are abysmal – something that makes our $12 trillion deficit look even more daunting. But never fear, the admin says that after the $400 “tax credit” and $250 “retirement benefit” hits home, we’ll bounce back. It should only be another six months or so before we know whether the stimulus worked or whether we need to do more.

I know the media is slobbering all over the airwaves declaring Obama’s First 100 Days some sort of miraculous transformation. And it is true that there have been some changes. I just can’t help wondering if they understood Obama meant changing the Constitution, drastically increasing powers of government, and taxing away freedom and liberty (and salaries) when he said he would “change” things. This is not what I was led to believe. I was expecting transparency, professionalism and competence, all the traits the Bush admin was supposedly lacking.

I wish I could say I was disappointed but I never believed the hype. I just don’t believe that anyone charged with the awesome responsibility of ensuring the safety, security and prosperity of the free world and beyond should be given a free pass because he’s more “hip” than the last guy, based on the pop culture standards of 22 year olds, of course. But I’ll sit through the Town Meeting – somehow – and listen to yet another campaign speech full of dire warnings and mile high promises of future action, knowing full well nothing has been delivered yet.

The A.P.’s Spin Meter notes in “SPIN METER: Saving federal money the easy way,” that the “thrifty measures Obama ordered for federal agencies are the equivalent of asking a family that spends $60,000 in a year to save $6.”

Hot Air’s Allahpundit sets his tongue firmly in his cheek …

And he points out, in “Gibbs: Obama’s tiny, tiny budget cut is big money where I’m from“:

Note Tapper’s follow-up about how Gibbs, just weeks ago, found the idea of $8 billion in earmarks — 80 times the size of this budget cut — “minuscule” in the context of the appropriations bill. Oh, and also the footage of Obama urging his cabinet to cut another $100 million from each of their agencies. Using Greg Mankiw’s analogy, that amounts to … what? A week’s worth of Starbucks?

Tapper has the amusing transcript:

I interjected in an exchange between White House press secretary Robert Gibbs and another reporter today, so I’ve included their exchange (with my interruption) as well as my own.

JENNIFER LOVEN, AP:  The $100 million target figure that the president talked about today with the Cabinet, can you explain why so small?  I know he talked about — you know, you add up 100 million and 100 million, and eventually, you get somewhere, but it would take an awfully long time to add up hundred million (inaudible) in the deficit.  Why not target a bigger number?

GIBBS:  (Smiling) Well, I think only in Washington, D.C. is a hundred million dollars…

LOVEN:  The deficit’s very large.  It’s not a joke.

GIBBS:  No, I’m…

LOVEN:  The deficit’s giant.  $100 million really is only a step.

GIBBS:  But no joke.

LOVEN:  You sound like you’re joking about it, but it’s not funny.

GIBBS:  I’m not making jokes about it.  I’m being completely sincere that only in Washington, D.C. is $100 million not a lot of money.  It is where I’m from.  It is where I grew up.  And I think it is for hundreds of millions of Americans.

LOVEN:  The point is it’s not a very big portion of the deficit.

TAPPER:  You were talking about an appropriations bill a few weeks ago about $8 billion being minuscule — $8 billion in earmarks. We were talking about that and you said that that…

GIBBS:  Well, in terms of — in…(CROSSTALK)

TAPPER:  …$100 million is a lot but $8 billion is small?

GIBBS:  Well, what I’m saying is I think it all adds up just as the president said, just as Jennifer was good enough to do in her question. If you think we’re going to get rid of $1.3 trillion deficit by eliminating one thing, I’d be — and the administration would be innumerably happy for you to let us know what that is.

LOVEN:  Why not try to get a bigger number so you can get a…

GIBBS:  Well, let me explain sort of what has happened.  Let’s walk through this so that everybody understands this. The president has laid out cuts, large and small, in both the administrative costs and in the program costs of the federal budget. Some of the examples that we were — we provided you all will add up. For instance, the Department of Veteran’s Affairs either cancels or delays 26 conferences that can be better or more effectively and more cost effectively done by video conferencing that saves almost $18 million.

A lot of these administrative things will add up.  This is a short-term goal to come back with over the course of the next few weeks to identify further administrative savings that secretaries haven’t already both identified and eliminated.

The president has also proposed savings on a much larger scale. The president has proposed ending the bank middle man for college loans, saving $94 billion over a ten-year period of time.  The president has attacked, in his budget, the subsidies that we provide insurance companies to provide the same Medicare coverage — private insurance companies the same type of Medicare coverage that’s already being offered at a savings of over $200 billion.

Jennifer, the reason that the president can stand up with the backing of the Congressional  Budget Office and talk about cutting the deficit in half over the course of four year’s time is because there are cuts that are large, student loans and Medicare Advantage, as well as small. This is the part of the president’s promise and proposal to go line by line through the federal budget deficit.  Will we enumerate programs that don’t work that we’re going to eliminate in the future? Yes.  Some of those cuts will be large.  Some of those cuts will be small.

But we’re not going to put ourselves back on a path toward fiscal sustainability if we don’t look at each and every item in this federal budget and make some of the cuts that are necessary to get us on that path.

– From “Today’s Qs for O’s WH – 4/20/2009 – Political Punc,” ABC News, April 20, 2009

As they say, you can fool some of the people … but …

Memeorandum.com has an excellent list of more bemused reactions to Obama’s silly exercise which, seriously, is an insult to the American people’s ability to detect bull-oney from substantive budget vigilance.