Isn’t that great?? Well, it would be if it was actually true. But it is not. For instance, did you know that Puerto Rico has 99 districts? Nope, me, either. Because they don’t. They have 1 (one). How about Arizona? Heck, they’ve got at least 38 (thirty-eight), right? Oh, wait, no they don’t – they have 8 (eight). The alleged “recovered jobs” bragged about by Biden and how our stimulus money is being spent don’t quite match up. I know, big surprise (almost as much as the following report being on ABCNews):

Wow that’s some “state of the art system” you got going on there, Joe. And I am SOOOOO sure that all of the problems are the result of people not knowing in which district they live. Oh, sure. Because it is so difficult to access that information. I mean, really, you might need to make a PHONE CALL or something. Or look it up on “the internets,” if it isn’t in the area in which you live. Because then, you could just take a little look-see at your voter registration card! Gosh, I am just stunned that they would not be getting these numbers right!

Speaking of jobs, check out these headlines:

This is exactly why so many of us are concerned about the Government running our health care system. Can you say fraud? If they cannot even get this right, how are they going to adequately address issues of life and death?? I don’t think even an abacus could help out there …

I reasonably can see “Don’t Ask, Don’t Tell” eliminated… I would never make this a litmus test for the Joint Chiefs of Staff. Obviously, there are so many issues that a member of the Joint Chiefs has to deal with, and my paramount obligation is to get the best possible people to keep America safe. But I think there’s increasing recognition within the Armed Forces that this is a counterproductive strategy — ya know, we’re spending large sums of money to kick highly qualified gays or lesbians out of our military, some of whom possess specialties like Arab-language capabilities that we desperately need. That doesn’t make us more safe, and what I want are members of the Joint Chiefs of Staff who are making decisions based on what strengthens our military and what is going to make us safer, not ideology.

So, he can “see” doing it, it’s just the ACTUAL doing it with which he seems to have problems.

As a bonus, here is something else Candidate Obama said in this interview when asked this questions:

What event or person has most affected your perceptions of or relationship to the LGBT community?
Somebody else who influenced me, I actually had a professor at Occidental — now, this is embarrassing because I might screw up his last name — Lawrence Goldyn, I think it was. He was a wonderful guy. He was the first openly gay professor that I had ever come in contact with, or openly gay person of authority that I had come in contact with. And he was just a terrific guy. He wasn’t proselytizing all the time (emphasis mine), but just his comfort in his own skin and the friendship we developed helped to educate me on a number of these issues.

Oh, yes, we LGBT people are practically missionaries. So glad this one professor didn’t “proselytize” his students, or push his “gay-ness” on them. What a guy. I’m sure it was difficult for him since, you know, that’s just how we are. Ahem.

And people wonder why I have said all along that Obama is not our friend? Because he is not.

Here is the story of one highly decorated pilot:

Here is a follow-up to Lt. Col. Fehrenbach’s story:

Did you catch the very beginning, the ways in which someone can have a service member investigated in both videos? Shocking. Just shocking.

As is the lack of any action whatsoever by Obama on this issue. Sure he gave a talk to the (sell out) HRC a month or so ago, claiming, once again, that he would abolish DADT at some point. But that’s just talk. Here is what President Obama has done thus far on this issue:

* crickets *

How many more broken promises before DADT is abolished? One thing is for sure. On the Eve of Veteran’s Day, there are too many new Veterans as a result of this law. 500 too many.

This is rich. We know about Obama’s many, many czars. Mark Steyn believes Obama has another one, someone of whom you have heard, but who isn’t on the usual list,

Obama Makes Bush His Blame Czar. You know, he has a point – we’ve been hearing for months now “He did it!” from Obama on all sorts of issues.

Steyn begins his piece writing about “Barack’s Rock,” Valerie Jarrett:

Valerie Jarrett announced the other day that “we’re going to speak truth to power.”

Who’s Valerie Jarrett? She’s “Senior Adviser” to the president of the United States – i.e., the leader of the most powerful nation on the face of the Earth. You would think the most powerful man in the most powerful nation would find a hard job finding anyone on the planet to “speak truth to power” to. But I suppose if you’re as eager to do so as his Senior Adviser, there’s always somebody out there: The Supreme Leader of Iran. The Prime Minister of Belgium. The Deputy Tourism Minister of the Solomon Islands. But no. The Senior Adviser has selected targets closer to home: “I think that what the administration has said very clearly is that we’re going to speak truth to power. When we saw all of the distortions in the course of the summer, when people were coming down to town hall meetings and putting up signs that were scaring seniors to death.”

Ah, right. People “putting up signs.” Can’t have that, can we? The most powerful woman in the inner circle of the most powerful man on Earth has decided to speak truth to powerful people standing in the street with handwritten placards saying “THIS GRAN’MA ISN’T SHOVEL READY.” Was it only a week ago that I wrote about this administration’s peculiar need for domestic enemies?

The Senior Adviser seems to have forgotten that she is the power. Admittedly, this is a recurring lapse on the part of the administration. There was Barack Obama only the other day, blaming everything on the president – no, no, silly, not him, the other fellow, the Designated Fall Guy who stepped down as head of state in January to accept the new constitutional position of Blame Czar. Musing on problems in Afghanistan, Obama blamed the “long years of drift” under his predecessor. The new president – OK, newish president – has been Drifter-in-Chief for almost a year but he’s too busy speaking truth to the former power to get on top of the situation. It could be a while yet. In his more self-regarding moments, such as his speech to the United Nations, he gives the strong impression that the “long years of drift” began in 1776.

Indeed, Ms. Jarrett thinks throwing around phrases pulled from those who are actually in the trenches will give her some street cred. You don’t think anyone fell for that hooey, do you? Just in case you know anyone who did, you can tell them that she is a lawyer, married to a doctor, and was on the Chicago Stock Exchange. So, yeah, not exactly a career in the Peace Corps., or hell, even AmeriCorps. Just more posturing on the part of the Obama Administration.

Just like Obama’s blame shifting. Just more posturing to protect his carefully crafted image:

Rocco Landesman, head honcho at the National Endowment for the Arts, seems closer to the reality of the situation. In his keynote address to the 2009 “Grantmakers in the Arts” conference, Landesman hailed Obama as “the most powerful writer since Julius Caesar”. He didn’t mean a “powerful writer” as in a compelling voice, gripping narrative, vivid characterization, command of language, etc. He meant a “powerful writer” as in Caesar was king of the world, and now Obama is. He came, he saw, he stimulated: “If you accept the premise, and I do, that the United States is the most powerful country in the world, then Barack Obama is the most powerful writer since Julius Caesar. That has to be good for American artists.”

I suppose so. He could invade somewhere and force the natives to accept degrading roles in NEA-funded performance art. He could take out the Iranian nuclear program by carpet-bombing it with unreadable literary novels. That is, if you “accept the premise” that the United States is the most powerful country in the world. Rocco Landesman may, but it’s not clear, from his actions (or inactions) in Eastern Europe, Iran, Afghanistan and elsewhere, that the president does. But, even so, it seems an odd pitch to “American artists.” Rocco Landesman, Speaking Goof to Power, isn’t the first Obama groupie to enjoy the kinky frisson of groveling obsequiousness, but he’s set an impressive new standard in public revelation thereof. Rocco’s aunt, Fran Landesman, is the great lyricist of “Spring Can Really Hang You Up The Most” as well as “The Ballad Of The Sad Young Men.” But surely there are few sadder middle-age men than her nephew, prostrating himself before his master as the most literate global colossus in two millennia.

Oh, I wouldn’t be so sure about that, but I take his point. Still, there are a whole bunch of sad “middle-age men” who would fit that bill. Chris Matthews springs immediately to mind.

Speaking of the NEA:

Meanwhile, Larry David is now doing televised NEA exhibits on his HBO show “Curb Your Enthusiasm.” Christians are said to be “angry” at him because of an episode in which, after he accidentally sprays his urine on a picture of Jesus, his assistant mistakes the droplets for tears and calls in her mother to witness the miracle of Christ weeping. Ha-ha! Oh, those brave transgressive artists! Of course, Christians aren’t “angry” in the sense that two U.S. residents arrested last week are. The pair – one an American citizen, the other Canadian – were so “angry” about the Muhammad cartoons published in the Danish newspaper Jyllands-Posten that they hatched a plot to kill the artist and his editor. As many commentators pointed out, Mr. David’s splashy stunt is a dreary provocation: It’s easy to be provocative with people who can’t be provoked. If he were to start urinating in a more Mecca-ly direction, he’d find an entirely more motivated crowd waiting for him at the stage door.

But I liked the point made by the Anchoress, a writer at the magazine First Things: Putting Muhammad, et al aside, if Larry David had a yen to urinate hither and yon, wouldn’t it have been “braver” to have done it to the religious icon du jour? That’s to say, Barack Obama. And then maybe Ashton Kutcher could have marveled at how even Obama’s image was empathizing tearily with all 687 million Americans without health insurance. Or, alternatively, dribbling warm champagne from his Norwegian Nobel banquet toast. C’mon, Larry. Sure, you might not have a career afterward, but, unlike any Islamo-provocations, you’re not gonna get killed. Just fired, and probably damned as a racist. But at least you wouldn’t be a simpering suck-up to power like Rocco Landesman and the other creeps.

“Religious icon du jour” – priceless. I mean, c’mon, obviously he is – just check out that Chia commercial. And I wouldn’t hold my breath on the end of sucking-up, but that’s just me:

At some point the Caesar cult has to manifest itself in an achievement – I mean a real achievement, not merely some dud prize handed out by Norwegian Lefties. Afghanistan is his now: Notwithstanding “years of drift,” whether it winds up as victory or defeat is his call. It’s Obama’s war. It’s Obama’s economy. The stimulus bill is his stimulus, and for $787 billion it created 30,000 new jobs (according to the government) or (according to the Associated Press) 25,000. Either way, you do the math. It’s Obama’s unemployment rate, Obama’s dollar, Obama’s debt. Pace Valerie Jarrett, the truth is you are the power. And those on the receiving end of it are going to be speaking a lot louder in the months ahead.

Yep, it surely is all Obama’s now. And not for nothing, but it isn’t like the Democrats didn’t control both houses for two years before Obama got into the White House. There is a lot for which Bush is responsible, but at some point, Obama needs to stop making him the Blame Czar, and start doing his job.

I am sure you will be SHOCKED to learn that Obama is acting in much the same way. I know, I know – what a surprise. Ahem. Well, it seems some one has been doing a little investigative journalism, something in VERY short supply of late. But get this – I tell you, you better be sitting down – in this case, it was – WAIT FOR IT –
MSNBC. YES, the very network to which we routinely refer as “MSNBO”! Once I recovered from the shock of it all, I couldn’t wait to see just how transparent President Obama was compared to Bush. (I wonder if there is a way for us to do a pool on these kinds of things, like for NCAA basketball or something?)

This is what MSNBC uncovered in this report:

Obama Names 110 White House Visitors

The White House on Friday released a small list of visitors to the White House since President Barack Obama took office in January, including lobbyists, business executives, activists and celebrities.

No previous administration has released such a list, though the information out so far is incomplete. Only about 110 names —and 481 visits —out of the hundreds of thousands who have visited the Obama White House were made public. Like the Bush administration before it, Obama is arguing that any release is voluntary, not required by law, despite two federal court rulings to the contrary.

The emphasis there is mine. This is a bit of a schizophrenic opening. On the one hand, they want to champion that Obama released 110 names – Woohoo!! On the other hand, they have to acknowledge that, once again, President Obama is using the SAME arguments as Bush. Moreover, this “Constitutional Scholar” is doing so in clear violation of not one, but TWO federal court rulings! Maybe the KoolAide was made improperly that day, I don’t know, but the report continues:

Under the Obama White House’s policy, most names of visitors from Inauguration Day in January through the end of September will never be released. The White House says it plans to release most of the names of visitors from October on, and that release is due near the end of the year. There are limitations there as well, including potential Supreme Court nominees, personal guests of the First Family, and certain security officials.

The names released Friday include business leaders and lobbyists with a lot to gain or lose from Obama policies. They include Microsoft co-founder Bill Gates (whose foundation is pushing for changes in teacher pay), former AIG chairman Maurice Greenberg, Exxon Mobil CEO Rex Tillerson, Chevron CEO David O’Reilly, Citigroup’s Vikram Pandit, Goldman Sachs CEO Lloyd Blankfein, JP Morgan’s James Dimon, Bank of America CEO Kenneth Lewis, John Stumpf of Wells Fargo, Morgan Stanley’s John Mack, State Street bank’s Ron Logue, BNY Mellon’s Robert Kelly, labor leader Andrew Stern of the Service Employees International Union (22 visits)*, American Bankers Association CEO Ed Yingling, community bankers president Camden Fine, and lobbyists Heather and Anthony Podesta, whose brother John Podesta led Obama’s transition team.

Besides Gates, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and General Electric CEO Jeffrey Immelt are also on the list. (Msnbc.com is a joint venture of Microsoft and NBC. One of NBC’s parents is GE.)

Advocates and nonprofit leaders include National Organization for Women President Kim Gandy, and Risa Lavizzo-Mourey, president of the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation, which is interested in health policy.

So, this is how Obama is paying these people and organizations back, by having them in the White House? I bet Kim Gandy was just all aflutter after she threw ALL women under the bus to endorse Obama over a life-long women’s advocate. There is more on her below.

I know many readers will be interested in this White House guest:

Democratic donor and businessman George Soros visited with White House aides twice.

Yes, indeedy, a major funder of Moveon.org has been to check up on his biggest investment – ahem – twice.

We’re just getting started:

Political figures include former Sen. Thomas Daschle, former House Speaker Newt Gingrich. Chicago Mayor Richard Daley, former Gov. Howard Dean, Sen. Al Franken, former Vice President Al Gore, former Federal Reserve Chairman Alan Greenspan, the late Sen. Edward Kennedy, and Democratic strategist Steve Elmendorf.

Celebrities at the White House include Oprah Winfrey, actors Brad Pitt, George Clooney and Denzel Washington, and tennis star Serena Williams. Journalists include Paul Krugman, the New York Times columnist and Nobel Prize winner in economics.

Conservative religious leader Gary Bauer visited, as did liberal civil rights leaders Al Sharpton and Jesse Jackson.

Okay, the last two, along with Oprah, are NOT a surprise. Gary Bauer? Just a tad surprising.

For anyone who wants to see more:

Msnbc.com has put the full list in a handy PDF file, and also in an Excel file for those who like to sort.

One guest is mighty interesting:

Not that Bill Ayers

The White House warns that many names that may appear familiar — and controversial — do not in fact refer to the most famous people to carry those names. Jeremiah Wright is on the list, but it’s not the president’s former pastor. This Michael Jordan is not the basketball player. This Michael Moore is not a filmmaker. The William Ayers who took a group tour of the White House isn’t the former radical from Chicago who figured so prominently in the 2008 campaign. And the Angela Davis on the list has a different middle initial than the activist and former fugitive.

The White House could have avoided some of that sort of confusion by providing more information on the visitors, such as an employer name and the city they hail from. For example, is the Shawn Carter who attended a poetry reading the same one who goes by Jay-Z and had campaigned for Obama?

“This unprecedented level of transparency can sometimes be confusing rather than providing clear information,” a White House special counsel, Norm Eisen, wrote on the White House blog.

If you spot a name on the list that bears investigating, please drop us a note.

Of COURSE we will just trust Obama and his spokes-minions when they assure us that this Bill Ayers could not POSSIBLY be domestic terrorist – Capitol Building and Pentagon bomber – long time friend and mentor Bill Ayers! He is just some guy who wanted to visit the White House Gift Shop and pick up a couple of Marine One helicopter models for his boys. I am sure of it. Sheesh. Really? They expect us to believe this crap? Evidently – they got plenty of other people to believe that kind of crap and more, so why stop now?

Okay – if you are consuming any liquids right this minute, I suggest you put it down when you read this:

Limited release

Despite the accompanying White House claim of “transparency like you’ve never seen before,” the Obama White House continues to take the same legal position as the Bush White House, arguing that the records are not public records subject to the Freedom of Information Act. Only limited “voluntary releases” are being made to settle a lawsuit filed by an advocacy group, though a federal judge has twice ruled that all the visitor logs are public. (Again, emphasis is mine.)

Yet there are severe limitations to the transparency:

Most of the visitors from Inauguration Day to September will never be released by the White House under this voluntary disclosure — unless the public can guess their names. The White House policy doesn’t allow members of the public or press to ask for “everyone who visited health czar Nancy-Ann DeParle,” or everyone who visited on May 4, or everyone from the American Medical Association. Only individual names can be checked.

I know, right? Didn’t this sound just a little pissy?? From someone at MSNBC?? The bigger picture is that the Obama Administration is BREAKING THE LAW. Hell to the YES, that information falls under FOIA – this is OUR White House, not the Obamas. We most definitely DO get to know every single John Smith and Jane Doe who cross the threshold of the White House. You better believe we do.

This is just the tip of the iceberg, but it is a start:

The list released at 4:30 p.m. Friday includes just about 110 names with 481 visits. Those names were among those requested by members of the public so far, for visits during the period from Inauguration Day through July. (That’s why we know of visits by the wrong Bill Ayers, the wrong Angela Davis, etc., but we don’t know of visits by countless unnamed lobbyists.) Members of the public who used the White House online form to check names did not receive a personal reply indicating whether or not the request was received, or whether the name appeared on the list, so the system provides no feedback. Does the absence of Bill Clinton’s name on the list mean that he has not been to the White House, or that the request wasn’t received by the White House online system?

A request for the complete records of all visitors from the first months of the administration, filed by msnbc.com, was rejected by the White House, and an appeal is pending. The news organization requested the names of all visitors to the Obama White House beginning with Inauguration Day. Msnbc.com has filed an administrative appeal with the Department of Homeland Security, which oversees the Secret Service.

Say whaa?? The White House rejected a request from their lapdog “news” source?? Huh. There’s a shocker. Welcome to the “Under The Bus” club, MSNBC!

The Wall Street Journal focused on the most frequent visitor to the White House. He was mentioned in the list above, but without the acknowledgment of the frequency:

SEIU’s Stern Tops White House Visitor List

Promising “transparency like you’ve never seen before,” The White House released its visitor log this evening under a new voluntary disclosure policy.

The log chronicles 481 visits to the White House from individuals ranging from Jay-Z to Bill Gates from January through July.

The list includes William Ayers, Jeremiah Wright, Michael Moore, Robert Kelly (R. Kelly), Malik Shabazz, and Michael Jordan.

But the White House said those aren’t the guys you’re thinking of. Nor is the log complete.

Ahahahahahahaha!!! I just cannot get enough of this one – sure, they aren’t the same people. Yeah, okay, we believe you. NOT. And because it is just so much fun to see them squirm, I am keeping in the part that is repetitive of the article above, especially the quotes from Eisen. Oh, what a funny guy:

“A lot of people visit the White House, up to 100,000 each month, with many of those folks coming to tour the buildings. Given this large amount of data, the records we are publishing today include a few ‘false positives’ – names that make you think of a well-known person, but are actually someone else,” Norm Eisen, a special counsel to the president, writes on the White House blog. “The well-known individuals with those names never actually came to the White House. Nevertheless, we were asked for those names and so we have included records for those individuals who were here and share the same names.”

Adds Eisen: “This unprecedented level of transparency can sometimes be confusing rather than providing clear information.”

Uh, ya know, I think we are all smart enough to not get all confused by this incredible level of “transparency.” Beginning with, we actually know the definition of “transparency,” something Eisen and Obama apparently do not.

And then there is this:

One thing is clear: *Service Employees International Union President Andrew Stern holds sway at the White House, where he’s listed for 22 visits—the top number on the logs. Visitors in the top 10 also include former Clinton White House Chief of Staff John Podesta, former Senate Majority Leader Tom Daschle, National Organization for Women President Kim Gandy, and NARAL Pro-Choice America President Nancy Keenan.

So THAT’S what Gandy and Keenan got for stabbing Hillary Clinton and, well, WOMEN, int he back – visits to the White House. I guess there is something gained by selling your soul, though, personally, I don’t think it is worth it. But that’s just me.

Anywho – yes, the President of the SEIU, again, the union co-founded by the founder of ACORN, Wade Rathke, is the TOP visitor at the White House. The SEIU has been in the news quite a bit, especially for holding California hostage – threatening that their good buddy, Obama, would not give the state any federal stimulus funds if it had the audacity to expect the union to cut wages like everyone else so the state wouldn’t go bankrupt. NOW we know how the union was able to do that. All those visits to the White House apparently paid off – for the union, not California, the state with one of the largest budgets around (as in 5th in the world). What makes this more egregious is that California pays a lot into the federal tax system and receives little comparatively speaking. And this union is allowed – by the White House – to hold it over a barrel. Yep, all those meetings seemed to do the trick!

Aren’t you just so heartened by all of this “transparency”? And by seeing who Obama is welcoming into our White House? Yeah, me, too. As long as the Obama Administration continues to thumb its nose at Federal Law, I reckon we should be “thankful” for this (no, not really – it’s BS that they are still sitting on so much information).

Oh, but if you can just GUESS who might else have been there and submit that form asking them, maybe you can confirm some other folks who have been there, too. Lemme know what you find out, okay? I am sure we would all just love to know…

Turns out I am not the only one who wonders why Obama continues to get a free pass for actions that, had Bush done them, would be front page news (and again, I have NO love lost for Bush – absolutely zero, but fair is fair). Josh Gerstein of Politico had these same questions, about which he wrote in this article, What If Bush Had Done That?. Indeed:

A four-hour stop in New Orleans, on his way to a $3 million fundraiser.

Snubbing the Dalai Lama.

Signing off on a secret deal with drug makers.

Freezing out a TV network.

Doing more fundraisers than the last president. More golf, too.

President Barack Obama has done all of those things — and more.

What’s remarkable is what hasn’t happened. These episodes haven’t become metaphors for Obama’s personal and political character — or consuming controversies that sidetracked the rest of his agenda.

It’s a sign that the media’s echo chamber can be a funny thing, prone to the vagaries of news judgment, and an illustration that, in politics, context is everything.

Conservatives look on with a mix of indignation and amazement and ask: Imagine the fuss if George W. Bush had done these things?

The media’s “echo chamber”? That is a kind reference for what they are really doing, or rather aren’t doing: their jobs. Conservatives aren’t the only ones questioning why this is happening. Anyone who truly cares about the our democracy and the state of journalism in this country are asking, too. But they do ask a good question:

And quickly add, with a hint of jealousy: How does Obama get away with it?

“We have a joke about it. We’re going to start a website: IfBushHadDoneThat.com,” former Bush counselor Ed Gillespie said. “The watchdogs are curled up around his feet, sleeping soundly. … There are countless examples: some silly, some serious.”

Indeed, Bush got grief for secret meetings with the oil industry, politicizing the White House and spending too much time on his beloved bike. But it’s not just Republicans who notice. Media observers note that the president often gets kid-glove treatment from the press, fellow Democrats and, particularly, interest groups on the left — Bush’s loudest critics, Obama’s biggest backers.

But others say there’s a larger phenomenon at work — in the story line the media wrote about Obama’s presidency. For Bush, the theme was that of a Big Business Republican who rode the family name to the White House, so stories about secret energy meetings and a certain laziness, intellectual and otherwise, fit neatly into the theme, to be replayed over and over again.

Obama’s story line was more positive from the start: historic newcomer coming to shake up Washington. So the negatives that sprung up around Obama — like a sense that he was more flash than substance — track what negative coverage he’s received, captured in a recent “Saturday Night Live” skit that made fun of his lack of accomplishments in office.

“There may well be almost an unconscious effort on the part of the media to give Obama a bit more slack because he is more likable, because he is the first African-American president. That plays into it,” said Sherry Bebitch Jeffe, a political analyst at the University of Southern California.

Democrats find the complaints of Obama “getting a pass” hard to stomach in light of the way the press treated Bush — particularly on the single biggest mistake of his presidency, relying on the faulty intelligence leading up to the war in Iraq. Now, Obama’s aides say, the positive coverage simply reflects the fact that their efforts are succeeding.

“As our administration makes progress on the agenda that Washington has ignored for too long, we expect we’ll get some news coverage of that progress that we like and some tough coverage that we don’t,” White House spokesman Josh Earnest said. “It’s not unlike the New Orleans Saints, who are getting lots of good coverage of their perfect record so far — certainly better coverage than the [2-5] Redskins — but it doesn’t mean the Saints have liked every story that’s been written about them since training camp. It goes with the territory.”

There are signs the friendly tone toward Obama is ebbing. Case in point: a front-page story in The New York Times noting that Obama’s all-male basketball games drew fire from the head of the National Organization for Women, who called the games “troubling.”

I agree that Bush seemed to be treated with kit gloves, way, way too much for my liking. The media does seem to enjoy determining who our next president will be. But even Bush’s treatment pales in comparison to the lovefest the MSM has had for Obama.

So yes, they are now asking why Obama excludes women (though he has now tried to rectify that by asking ONE woman, Melody Barnes, to play golf with him) in his games? We have known for ages that often, it is on the golf course or basketball court that favors are curried or power is amassed, hence the desire for women to achieve membership in numerous country clubs across the country. Oh, and Obama’s response to the NY Time’s articles highlighting that women were excluded? “Bunk, ” he said. Uh, yeah, no. It isn’t, President Obama.

There are too many examples of just how Obama has been allowed to skate free:

But here are other stories in which Obama seems to have gotten a pass:

New Orleans

As a candidate, Obama railed against the Bush administration for abandoning and then neglecting the people of New Orleans during Hurricane Katrina. He made five campaign trips to the city.

But as president, Obama waited almost nine months before visiting the Big Easy, spent less than four hours on the ground there and then jetted to San Francisco for a $3 million Democratic fundraiser.

“Don’t judge anybody on the amount of time that they’ve spent there. Judge only what this administration promised that they would do, what they’ve done every day and what they’re continuing to work on,” press secretary Robert Gibbs said, pointing to positive reviews of the federal government’s efforts under Obama.

For their part, Democrats can’t see how Bush officials can muster much umbrage over anything related to New Orleans, given how the Republican administration handled the initial response to Katrina.

Forget “Bush Officials.” How about us plain ol’ Americans? We’re pretty pissed off about it, too. Just saying. A biggie is this:

Managing The Press

When the Obama administration moved in recent weeks to isolate and disparage Fox News as a wing of the Republican Party, there were few immediate howls of outrage — even from Fox’s fellow journalists in the media.

Press defenders and First Amendment advocates who jumped on the Bush administration for using military analysts to shape war coverage reacted with a yawn to the White House’s announcement that it had deemed Fox to be not a “legitimate news organization.”

“Had I said about MSNBC what the Obama White House said about Fox, the media uproar would still be going on,” said Ari Fleischer, who served as Bush’s press secretary until 2003. “I instinctively would have known … the media would have leapt to their feet to defend them. I’m shocked it’s not happening now.”

One press veteran agreed. “If George Bush had taken on MSNBC, what would have happened?” said Phil Bronstein, editor-at-large of the San Francisco Chronicle. “That’s one place you can point to a real difference in how I’d imagine Bush would be treated.”

No freakin’ kidding. People would be screaming their fool heads off about free speech. But the Obamam crowd? They just jump on the Fox bashing bandwagon. Nice.

And this is a big one, too:

Politicizing the White House

Throughout the Bush administration, liberal critics warned that the hand of Bush political adviser Karl Rove was spreading politics into all corners of government. Reporters were on alert for any sign that politics was infecting the work of federal agencies. One top appointee got in hot water for allegedly asking agency officials to work to “help our candidates” across the country.

So some Bush aides went nearly apoplectic earlier this month when they spotted Gibbs and Obama’s political guru, David Axelrod, in photos of a Situation Room meeting on Afghanistan policy.

“Oh, the howling and screaming that would have happened if Karl Rove was sitting in on even a deputies-level meeting where strategy was being hammered out. People would have just gone ballistic,” said Peter Feaver, a former White House aide for both Bush and Bill Clinton.

Also, in about nine months, Obama has already attended more than two dozen fundraising events, while Bush did only six in his first year in office, according to a tally by CBS’s Mark Knoller.

Gibbs said Obama had to do more to raise a similar amount of money, since the kinds of soft-money fundraisers Bush did early on were banned. “This president … doesn’t accept money from PACs or lobbyists and doesn’t allow lobbyists to give at fundraisers that he’s at, as well,” Gibbs added.

Uh, yeah, sure, okay, Mr. Mealy Mouth Man. We all buy that one, right? Uh, yeah, no.

Then there is this one:

Dealing With Business, In Secret

Bush and Vice President Dick Cheney endured years of criticism and lawsuits that stretched all the way to the Supreme Court over secret meetings Cheney’s Energy Task Force held with oil and gas companies. When the policy emerged, critics said Cheney was carrying water for the industry.

Obama pledged to hash out health care reform live on C-SPAN and excoriated Bush for kowtowing to the drug industry. But aides signed off on the drug industry’s agreement to find $80 billion in savings to support reform. However, Obama aides didn’t disclose that the agreement involved the White House promising that current health legislation wouldn’t include further cuts or give the government the right to negotiate over drug prices.

I admit, this did actually get a rise from a few folks, like Greg Palast. But that moment seems to have passed now. Now, people rarely mention it. Big surprise…

And another issue near and dear to many of us:

Toning Down Human Rights

During the campaign, Obama talked tough on China. While candidate Obama pushed Bush to take a hard line, President Obama hasn’t. Hoping to win China’s help on Iran and North Korea, Obama skipped a meeting with the Dalai Lama and said little when China undertook a violent crackdown in its largely Muslim Xinjiang region. The White House has pledged to meet with the Dalai Lama later.

And while candidate Obama warned Bush against a “reckless and cynical initiative [that] would reward a regime in Khartoum that has a record of failing to live up to its commitments,” President Obama’s envoy to Sudan, Scott Gration, seemed to lay out a similar incentive-driven approach.

“We’ve got to think about giving out cookies,” said Gration. “Kids, countries — they react to gold stars, smiley faces, handshakes, agreements, talk, engagement.” The White House backed away from Gration’s characterization of the strategy but did recently lay out a strategy of engaging with the Sudanese regime.

Obama snubbed the DALAI LAMA. C’mon already – THAT’S not going to get an outcry? He’s the DALAI LAMA, for pete’s sake! No? *Crickets*

Just for, um, fun:

Traveling And Recreating

In his campaign and as president, Bush was mocked for a lack of interest in all things foreign — seven minutes touring the Kremlin, 25 minutes at the Great Wall of China, before declaring, “Let’s go home.”

During a trip to Europe in June, Obama chastised German and French reporters for suggesting that he was snubbing those countries by making only brief stops in each. “There are only 24 hours in the day. And so there’s nothing to any of that speculation beyond us just trying to fit in what we could do on such a short trip,” he told reporters in Germany.

But after taking his wife out for an attention-grabbing date night, Obama promptly jetted back to Washington. Within about 90 minutes of arriving at the White House, the tightly scheduled president was on the move again — headed to Andrews Air Force Base to play nine holes of golf.

How quickly people change. If Bush had done ANY of these things, the HuffPo and Daily Kos crowds would have been going ballistic about it. But now that it’s THEIR guy, it’s peachy keen. Where is the sense of fair play? Where is the concept of right is right? No, all of that gets completely thrown out of the window if it is someone they actually LIKE.

That is just sad. While ethics can be situational, the similarities between Bush and Obama are glaring, as many of us said they were all along. To completely disregard any sense of decency because it’s their guy weakens their arguments about choosing him in the first place. It makes it crystal clear that this is about winning at all costs, and choosing someone with little more than a teleprompter to do so.

It weakens their arguments against Bush, too, though they will most likely never admit that. But it’s true. In this case, what’s god for the gander, is, well, good for the gander.

Maybe if the media actually starts to do its job (for instance, where are all of the photos of Obama playing golf all of the time? Or basketball? They never failed to show Bush playing or riding his bike.), maybe they will start to open their eyes. One can hope, anyway. In the meantime, it continues to be our job to hold Obama’s feet to the fire for decisions he makes, and doesn’t make. It is our job to hold up the glaring similarities between Bush and Obama. And do so we will…

General McChrystal’s proposal for Afghanistan has been on Obama’s desk for almost two months now. And what is Obama doing about it? Well, he appears to be deciding on how to decide what his decision will be, but he’s not there yet. Nope, instead, he is throwing up some smokescreen about the need for a do-over in Afghanistan’s election (wait – how come WE can’t get one of those??) before he will commit. And smokescreen it is. Even Secretary of Defense Gates has told him he can’t wait that long.

Obama needs to stop tip-toeing around Afghanistan, and own it, as a part of his presidency. For that matter, he needs to own his presidency, as Peggy Noonan points out in this commentary, It’s His Rubble Now: And the American people want him to fix it.. Uh, yeah. Pretty much. She writes:

At a certain point, a president must own a presidency. For George W. Bush that point came eight months in, when 9/11 happened. From that point on, the presidency—all his decisions, all the credit and blame for them—was his. The American people didn’t hold him responsible for what led up to 9/11, but they held him responsible for everything after it. This is part of the reason the image of him standing on the rubble of the twin towers, bullhorn in hand, on Sept.14, 2001, became an iconic one. It said: I’m owning it.

Mr. Bush surely knew from the moment he put the bullhorn down that he would be judged on everything that followed. And he has been. Early on, the American people rallied to his support, but Americans are practical people. They will support a leader when there is trouble, but there’s an unspoken demand, or rather bargain: We’re behind you, now fix this, it’s yours.

President Obama, in office a month longer than Bush was when 9/11 hit, now owns his presidency. Does he know it? He too stands on rubble, figuratively speaking—a collapsed economy, high and growing unemployment, two wars. Everyone knows what he’s standing on. You can almost see the smoke rising around him. He’s got a bullhorn in his hand every day.

It’s his now. He gets the credit and the blame. How do we know this? The American people are telling him. You can see it in the polls. That’s what his falling poll numbers are about. “It’s been almost a year, you own this. Fix it.”

Pretty much. Though he seems to be using his bullhorn for all the wrong things, IMHO. Noonan continues:

The president doesn’t seem to like this moment. Who would? He and his men and women have returned to referring to what they “inherited.” And what they inherited was, truly, terrible: again, a severe economic crisis and two wars. But their recent return to this theme is unbecoming. Worse, it is politically unpersuasive. It sounds defensive, like a dodge.

The president said last week, at a San Francisco fund-raiser, that he’s busy with a “mop,” “cleaning up somebody else’s mess,” and he doesn’t enjoy “somebody sitting back and saying, ‘You’re not holding the mop the right way.’” Later, in New Orleans, he groused that reporters are always asking “Why haven’t you solved world hunger yet?” His surrogates and aides, in appearances and talk shows, have taken to remembering, sometimes at great length, the dire straits we were in when the presidency began.

This is not a sign of confidence. Nor were the president’s comments to a New York fund-raiser this week. Democrats, he said to the Democratic audience, are “an opinionated bunch.” They always have a lot of thoughts and views. Republicans, on the other hand—”the other side”—aren’t really big on independent thinking. “They just kinda sometimes do what they’re told. Democrats, ya’ll thinkin’ for yourselves.” It is never a good sign when the president gets folksy, dropping his g’s, because he is by nature not a folksy g-dropper but a coolly calibrating intellectual who is always trying to guess, as most politicians do, what normal people think. When Mr. Obama gets folksy he isn’t narrowing his distance from his audience but underlining it. He shouldn’t do this.

But the statement that Republicans just do what they’re told was like his famous explanation of unhappy voters are people who “cling to guns or religion.” (What comes over him at fund-raisers?) Both statements speaks of a political misjudgment of his opponents and his situation.They show a misdiagnosis of the opposition that is politically tin-eared. Politicians looking to win don’t patronize those they’re trying to win over.

No kidding – insulting people you want to win over is thoroughly unhelpful, though it’s a strategy we have seen way too much of of late (and for a great post on that little soundbite of Obama’s, I recommend fellow No Quarter writer, Ani’s, post, “President Obama Is Insulting Americans Again”). I, for one, do not respond well to it, but that’s just me.

Back to Noonan:

But the point on the We Inherited a Terrible Situation and It’s Not Our Fault argument is, again, that it is worse than unbecoming. It is unpersuasive.

How do we know this? Through the polls. In all of the major surveys, the president’s popularity has gone down the past few months. A Gallup Daily Tracking Poll out this week reported Mr. Obama’s job approval dropped nine points during the third quarter of this year, that is between July 1 and Sept. 30, when it fell from 62% to 53%. It was the biggest such drop Gallup has ever measured for an elected president during the same period of his term. A Fox News poll out Thursday showed support for the president’s policies falling below 50% for the first time. Ominously for him, independents are peeling off. In 2006 and 2008 independents looked like Democrats. They were angry and frustrated by the wars, they sought to rebuke the Bush White House. Now those independents look like Republicans. They worry about joblessness, debts and deficits.

The White House sees the falling support. Thus the reminder: We faced an insuperable challenge, we’re mopping up somebody else’s mess.

The Democratic Party too sees the falling support, and is misunderstanding it. The great question they debated last week was whether the president is tough enough: Does he come across as too weak? It is true, as the cliché has it, that it’s helpful for a president to be both revered and feared. But this president is not weak, that’s not his problem. He willed himself into the presidency with an adroit reading of the lay of the land, brought together and dominated all the constituent pieces of victory, showed and shows impressive self-discipline, seems in general to stick to a course once he’s chosen it, though arguably especially when he’s wrong. His decision to let Congress write a health-care bill may yield at least the appearance of victory. And if Mr. Obama isn’t twisting arms like LBJ, and then giving just an extra little jerk to snap the rotator cuff just for fun, the case can be made that day by day he’s moving the Democrats of Congress in the historic direction he desires. All his adult life he’s played the long game, which takes patience and skill.

She forgot the lying, cheating, stealing, and downright theft, that helped propel Obama into the presidency, but whatever. What I don’t get is why people continue to forget that the Democrats were in charge of both houses of Congress for TWO YEARS before Obama became president. All of the stuff that happened in the two preceding years, like the stimulus bill, the economy, all of that, is on their hands. This, “Oh, poor me – look at how much I have to clean up! Being president is HARD WORK, just like Bush said!” has long passed its usefulness, if it ever had any.

It’s more than that:

The problem isn’t his personality, it’s his policies. His problem isn’t what George W. Bush left but what he himself has done. It is a problem of political judgment, of putting forward bills that were deeply flawed or off-point. Bailouts, the stimulus package, cap-and-trade; turning to health care at the exact moment in history when his countrymen were turning their concerns to the economy, joblessness, debt and deficits—all of these reflect a misreading of the political terrain. They are matters of political judgment, not personality. (Republicans would best heed this as they gear up for 2010: Don’t hit him, hit his policies. That’s where the break with the people is occurring.)

The result of all this is flagging public support, a drop in the polls, and independents peeling off.

In this atmosphere, with these dynamics, Mr. Obama’s excuse-begging and defensiveness won’t work.

Everyone knows he was handed horror. They want him to fix it.

At some point, you own your presidency. At some point it’s your rubble. At some point the American people tell you it’s yours. The polls now, with the presidential approval numbers going down and the disapproval numbers going up: That’s the American people telling him.

Not for nothing, but he kept telling US he could handle this job. Many of us knew he couldn’t, wouldn’t, but at some point, it’s sink or swim, and we are already beyond that point. No more whining and crying about the crap sandwich you got handed when you fought so dirty to get there in the first place. I guarantee you, Hillary Clinton wouldn’t be complaining left and right. She’d push up her shirt sleeves and get to work. That is what we expect of Obama, too.

Oh, one last thing. About those fundraisers Obama is flitting around doing while we have all of these major issues detailed above? In the first nine months of his presidency, Obama has gone to TWENTY-THREE fundraisers. In the first twenty, he has raised $20 million for the DNC coffers. That’s just jake.

Want to guess how many Bush did in the same amount of time? Six. I said, SIX. And Bush raised $48 million from his six, and he did none after the attacks on September 11th.

I can’t leave Bill Clinton out. He did five fundraisers in nine months. That’s it.

Sure shows you what is important to Obama, and it is not running this country. Time for him to own the presidency he fought so dirty to get, and roll up HIS shirt sleeves like Secretary Clinton has done. Way, way past time, in fact. Get to it already.

President Obama’s presidential campaign focused on “making” the news media cover certain issues while rarely communicating anything to the press unless it was “controlled,” White House Communications Director Anita Dunn disclosed to the Dominican government at a videotaped conference.

“Very rarely did we communicate through the press anything that we didn’t absolutely control,” said Dunn.

“One of the reasons we did so many of the David Plouffe videos was not just for our supporters, but also because it was a way for us to get our message out without having to actually talk to reporters,” said Dunn, referring to Plouffe, who was Obama’s chief campaign manager.

Here she is, telling the tale. You don’t have to wait long to hear her say it:

Doesn’t that make you feel all warm and “tingly” inside? Yeah, me too. I think it’s called high blood pressure:

Continued Dunn: “Whether it was a David Plouffe video or an Obama speech, a huge part of our press strategy was focused on making the media cover what Obama was actually saying as opposed to why the campaign was saying it, what the tactic was. … Making the press cover what we were saying.”

Dunn was speaking at a Jan. 12, 2009, event focusing on Obama’s media tactics and hosted by the Global Foundation for Democracy and Development, which seeks to promote collaboration between the U.S. and the Dominican Republic. The event was held in Santo Domingo and was attended by the country’s president.

Did you catch that? She said this over NINE months ago. NINE!! And this is just now coming out? Way to make the case, Ms. Dunn – the media is nothing but a bullhorn for whatever you tell them to say. Pathetic.

You may know Ms. Dunn for other reasons that have been in the news of late. The first would be her starting a war with Fox News:

Dunn has been facing some criticism since she led a White House campaign last week against Fox News, slamming the top-rated network as an “arm of the Republican Party” and “opinion journalism masquerading as news.”

From her own lips:

But you know, not everyone will role over for Ms. Dunn paving the way of The One:

Fox hit back this past Friday, releasing a video of Dunn speaking to high school students last June in which she lists her two “favorite political philosophers,” including Communist Chinese leader Mao Tse-tung, whose draconian policies are blamed for the deaths of tens of millions of people.

Oh, yeah – she said it. Not Mother Teresa and, say, Nelson Mandela. Or Martin Luther King, Jr. Or Ghandi. Or the Dalai Lama. Nope. Mao Tse-tung:

Holy smokes. In case you need a little refresher of who Mao is, you can click HERE.

So, that’s the White House Communications Director, Anita Dunn. She seems to fit right into the Obama crowd, doesn’t she? I’m sure she and Bill Ayers probably have a lot to talk about, or maybe she just hangs out with Obama’s old Socialist Party friends (remember that? Oh, yeah – card-carrying member of the New Party.). Hey, it could happen!!

I do know that this admission is mighty disturbing. To have confirmed by the White House Communications Director that they purposely controlled the media, thus the message, is telling. And scary as shit, I might add. As is the press ALLOWING itself to be manipulated in this way. Maybe now we really can stop calling them the “press,” and instead call them the Obama Propaganda Team? Or Orchestrated For America? What’s your take?

It isn’t just the Gay Folks who are getting a bit testy, as the video below indicates, but those of us Gay people who DID buy that Obama was going to do something for us (I don’t know what came over them) sure had something to say in the March on Oct. 10th (H/T to Logistics Monster for the video):

I came across this article by B. Daniel Blatt recently that addresses the frustrations of the GLBT community with Barack Obama, Gay Community Increasingly at Odds with Democrats. Considering the constant pandering, all talk, and no action, it is easy to see why we would be inreasingly discontented with Obama (those who were content with him in the first place, that is).

Mr. Blatt comes from a different political position than I do, and I appreciate his take here:

Perhaps the easiest thing about being a gay conservative is that we expect less from our elected leaders than do our left-of-center counterparts. Republican politicians don’t promise us the moon and stars in their campaigns, so we’re not disappointed when they don’t bestow such lofty gifts on our community once elected.

Huh. I hadn’t thought of it that way before. Interesting. He continues:

For gay Democrats, however, it’s a different story. They are repeatedly disappointed when their politicians do not follow through on the campaign pledges they make to our community.

In 1992, then-Democratic presidential candidate Bill Clinton promised to repeal the ban on gays in the military, but just a year later, he backpedaled on that promise. After he clumsily tried to act on that promise in the first few days of his administration, that Democrat realized he might suffer politically should he sign an executive order repealing the ban. At the time, the president’s signature was all that was required to allow gay men and lesbians to serve openly in the military.

Facing a firestorm of opposition from the military and Congress, Clinton relented and signed a supposed compromise policy, the legislation which became known as Don’t Ask/Don’t Tell (DADT). Gays could now serve, provided they didn’t self-identify as gay. Now the ban on open service is codified, requiring an act of Congress to be repealed.

This would not be the last time Clinton would sign legislation upsetting gay people who so enthusiastically backed him in 1992.

In the dead of night on September 20, 1996, after receiving the endorsement of the left-leaning gay rights organization Human Rights Campaign (HRC), the Democrat signed the Defense of Marriage Act (DOMA), allowing one state to bar recognition of same-sex marriages performed in a different state while defining marriage, for the purposes of federal law, as the union of one man and one woman. Although its then-leaders denounced the action, HRC did not rescind its endorsement of the then-Democratic incumbent.

Now, you know, I love me my Bill Clinton. Not as much as his wife, mind you, but still…It’s a different day now than it was even then:

Perhaps with that bit of history in mind, the current Democratic President Barack Obama thought that by currying favor with this bastion of the gay Washington, D.C., establishment, he could silence the growing chorus of criticism from erstwhile gay supporters upset by his failure to act on his campaign promises to repeal those two bills. This past Saturday, the president addressed HRC’s annual dinner in Washington where he reiterated his campaign pledges:

We are moving ahead on Don’t Ask Don’t Tell. … We should not be punishing patriotic Americans who have stepped forward to serve this country. We should be celebrating their willingness to show such courage and selflessness on behalf of their fellow citizens, especially when we’re fighting two wars. … And I’ve called on Congress to repeal the so-called Defense of Marriage Act.

As a reminder, I severed my long-standing membership with the HRC after it endorsed Barack Obama over Hillary Clinton, one a proven advocate for the GLBT community, and one who is not. Wanna guess which one is which? Yep – Hillary is, Obamais not. That doesn’t seem to have sunk in with the folks at the HRC dinner, but other people are getting it:

That may have earned him a standing ovation inside the auditorium, but it did not quiet the criticism outside. Indeed, if anything, the speech only served to increase its volume. Left-of-center lesbian blogger Pam Spaulding took umbrage at the president’s failure to offer a timeline for repeal:

The low expectations I had regarding LGBT policy were unfortunately met on that account. If you’re an activist or citizen looking for timelines, actions, use of the bully pulpit, ANYTHING that would indicate to the community that our president was serious about moving on the laundry list of LGBT issues any time soon, you would call it a fail.

Others found different reasons to call the speech “a fail.” Left-wing gay bloggers Andrew Sullivan and Dan Savage said it sounded more like a campaign speech than a presidential address, with the latter offering, “Sorry, folks, nothing new to see here. Pledges, promises, excuses. Lip service.” They were not alone. The New York Times reported that one reader of the Bilerico Project quipped in a comment to that gay blog, “I could have watched one of his old campaign speeches and heard the same thing.”

And you know how much I just LOVE Andrew Sullivan (that was major snark – he has attacked yours truly a number of times, tongue in cheek nominating me for the Michael Moore Award. I suppose I could do worse.). He was a major Obama sycophant, singing his praises left and right, downright bubbly in his support of The One. THat is al to say, I have little sympathy that he is now so disenchanted with Obama. Maybe he could have done a little more research – check that – maybe he could have done SOME research into Obama before throwing his weight behind him. Just a thought.

And he is not the only Obama supporter and GLBT community member who is now frustrated with Obama:

John Aravosis of Americablog was less restrained in his reaction to the speech:

What did President Obama say new tonight? Absolutely nothing. … It is criminal that any gay rights organization would invite an embattled president to their dinner, giving him political cover for repeated broken promises and slaps in the face to our community (like the DOMA incest brief), and then get absolutely nothing in return. HRC’s actions only feed the suspicions of critics who say that the organization is more interested in fundraisers than in advancing our rights.

All in all, the evening was a disappointment, but not unexpected. President Obama doesn’t do controversy, and we, my friends, are controversy. So, the bad blood between this administration and the gay community will remain, and continue to worsen.

By this measure, the incumbent Democrat is a lot like the last Democrat to sit in the White House: both seek to avoid controversy, particularly on gay issues. And yet, in seeking to avoid controversy in the general population, Obama has further stirred the pot in the gay community. Even some of his most zealous defenders on the gay left have refused to cut him any slack for his failure to move forward on repealing DADT and DOMA.

Well, and they shouldn’t cut him any slack. Then again, IMHO, they should have pushed harder for a real advocate – Hillary – than the guy they thought was “cool,” or whatever the hell they were thinking – if indeed they were. Blatt continues:

And these outraged voices on the gay left have a greater opportunity today to make public their views than did their counterparts in the Clinton era. Many of them blog, some for heavily trafficked sites. These bloggers have prevented the voices of the establishment gay organizations from dominating the discourse (as they had in years past). When HRC’s president Joe Solmonese made excuses for the president’ s inaction, these bloggers were quick to take him to task.

Due in large part to the integrity of these gay left bloggers, a “schism,” as Spaulding puts it, has opened up between “Gay Inc. [and] the grassroots”. The blogosphere, in short, has changed everything. Gay Inc. (to use Spaulding’s epithet for the establishment gay organizations) no longer reigns supreme as the public voice of the gay community.

It has been supplemented by voices less submissive to the dictates of the Democratic Party. Blogs have given disgruntled Democrats a larger megaphone with which to express their disappointment with a party whose leaders have long assumed that gay voters would remain in their camp even if they didn’t act on their campaign promises.

And Americans have become increasingly aware that the gay community does not speak with one voice. Nor does it march it lockstep to the tune of the Democratic Party.

Sure, Obama made a small move recently and nominated Clifford Stanley, a 33 year Marine two star general (retired), to this position:

President Barack Obama intends to nominate Dr. Clifford L. Stanley as the undersecretary of Defense for Personnel and Readiness — the position within the Defense Department that oversees the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy.

“He is likely to be the president’s key Pentagon player in the ‘don’t ask, don’t tell’ debate and will be critical for the president in getting military uniform buy-in,” said Aubrey Sarvis, executive director of the repeal lobby group Servicemembers Legal Defense Network.

Well, that’s just peachy keen. I don’t know how long it will take to get him confirmed, but it’s just another step. Honestly – HOW much longer are we going to have to debate this horrible legislation?? Did Obama not promise to abolish DADT shortly after he took office? He has a Super Majority, for pete’s sake, and at the very least, he could employ a stay on DADT, but no (as of Oct.17, 459 service members fired under DADT).

But this is a bigger picture issue than DADT, or even DOMA, for that matter. It’s how an entire segment of the population is treated disparately that is the issue.

Along those lines, I think a number of people have started to realize that Democrats do a lot of talking, very little listening, and even less fulfilling of campaign promises made, GLBT people included. Perhaps we can learn that one has to look at more than the letter beside the name, and really look at the candidate. For instance, John McCain stood up for a friend who came out, extending his support to him. Obama, on the other hand, campaigned with, and consistently surrounded himself with, homophobes (McClurkin, Meeks, and Kmiec, to name just three). That is to say, maybe, and I include myself in this, we need to look beyond the letters beside the names, and really look at the people, their character, their words, and how they match up with their actions. Maybe then, these people who gave of their money, and their VOTE, wouldn’t be so disappointed, and frustrated, now. Just a thought.

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?

Here is the article:

President Barack Obama will focus “at the right time” on how to overturn the “don’t ask, don’t tell” ban on gays serving openly in the military, his national security adviser said Sunday.

“I don’t think it’s going to be — it’s not years, but I think it will be teed up appropriately,” James Jones said.

The Democratic-led Congress is considering repealing the 1993 law. Action isn’t expected on the issue until early next year.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid, D-Nev., recently wrote Obama and Defense Secretary Robert Gates asked to share their views and recommendations on the contentious policy. In Sept. 24 letters, Reid also asked for a review of the cases of two U.S. officers who were discharged from the military because of their sexuality.

So far, this is absolutely nothing we have not heard before, is it? No. But wait, there’s more:

“At a time when we are fighting two wars, I do not believe we can afford to discharge any qualified individual who is willing to serve our country,” Reid wrote.

Jones said Obama “has an awful lot on his desk. I know this is an issue that he intends to take on at the appropriate time. And he has already signaled that to the Defense Department. The Defense Department is doing the things it has to do to prepare, but at the right time, I’m sure the president will take it on.”

As a candidate, Obama signaled support for repealing the law. To the disappointment of gay-rights supporters, he has yet to made a move since taking office in January. The White House has said it will not stop the military from dismissing gays and lesbians who acknowledge their http://www.blogger.com/img/blank.gifsexuality.

Last year, 634 members of the military were discharged for being gay, or .045 percent of the active-duty U.S. force, according to an Aug. 14 congressional report.
The largest number of gays who were ousted under the “don’t ask, don’t tell” policy came in 2001, when 1,227 were discharged, or .089 of the force.
The House is considering legislation to repeal “don’t ask, don’t tell” and allow people who have been discharged under the policy to rejoin the military.
Jones appeared on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

Wait, what did General Jones say? John “It Is Hard For Me To Feel Sorry For This Former Obama Cheerleader” Aravosis was none too happy about the pronouncement by the National Security Adviser in this post:

Apparently, General Jones would have us believe that President Obama wasn’t aware that we were fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan when he promised to lift the gay ban during the campaign in exchange for our votes. So, Jones tells us today, Obama can’t get to that particular promise right now because he’s busy fighting wars in Iraq and Afghanistan. Uh huh.

So when exactly are both of those wars going to be over? I’m guessing some time after Obama leaves office. And that of course assumes that we don’t have more wars to “distract” the president.

Jones just set us back. Again. He just gave the Republicans, and conservative Dems, the perfect talking point. Should anyone – members of Congress or the administration – move to lift the ban any time before these wars are over, our opponents will simply quote General Jones saying that to lift the ban during war time would be too distracting.

What could Jones have said? How about, there’s a new analysis from a Department of Defense-related publication that same the ban can be lifted without hurting morale and cohesion. Or how about saying that the President just wrote to Senator Reid, agreeing to work together to lift the ban?

Once again, let me just interject that those of us who were paying attention BEFORE the Election, during the Primaries, were very much aware that Obama wasn’t going to do a damn thing for us, at least not in a timely fashion. There were clues: Never marching in one Pride parade EVER, unlike Hillary Clinton; Donnie McClurkin, “Cured homosexual”; State Senator The Rev. James Meeks; Doug Kmiec; and Pastor Rick Warren, to name just a few. The information was there for those who were willing to see. I’m just sayin’. Back to Aravosis:

Nope. None of that. All we got was another reason why the president may never be able to keep his promise. The Obama administration is doing next to nothing – and perhaps nothing altogether – to move the ball forward on repealing DADT. This isn’t the kind of policy you just wake up one morning and say “ah, today is the day to lift the ban.” Bill Clinton found that out the hard way. It takes months, if not years, of preparation. Working the PR angles, the media, the grassroots, the public at large, the Pentagon. While we have no idea what if anything Obama is doing to work the Pentagon – though Jones’ repeated unhelpful remarks suggest that whatever the president is doing, it isn’t working – we certainly do know what he’s doing on the Hill. Zippo. Harry Reid had to write Obama a letter last week begging him help. And in terms of lobbying the public, we get unhelpful statements like what Jones did, again, today.

In the end, don’t think that Jones is simply freelancing. There is no way a senior administration official goes on TV and keeps screwing up like this. At first it’s a screw up. After this many times, it’s part of the plan. And the plan is to move the goal posts again and again and again until Obama can pass his gay rights promises to the next president, assuming we get a Democrat elected again this century.

No, there isn’t any way a senior administration official goes on CNN and says something like this all on his own. Seeing what the General really said is what made that AOL headline so incredibly misleading (the Yahoo link for General Jones was far more accurate). That seems to be a bit of water-carrying to me, a hope that it will deflect some of the frustration being voiced about Obama now, including on SNL this past Saturday night (10/3).

In other words, not only does it appear Obama isn’t getting to DADT in a timely fashion, he may not be getting to it at ALL. I wish I could tell you I am surprised, but unlike Mr. Aravosis, this is what I feared was going to happen under Obama.

As of Monday, October 5th, 439 service members have been discharged under “DADT” under the Obama Administration. For how long will those numbers go up? Will it indeed be until Obama is out of office?

Remember that “3:00AM” ad? Who would we want answering the phone? This woman, that’s who.

Instead we have President Obama, who has gotten his early morning call, particularly regarding Afghanistan. He’s letting it go to voice-mail. Hey, he has more important things to do, like go to Copenhagen to push for Chicago to get the Olympic Games in 2016. Yep – it’s true. He’s making a “personal” appeal – presumably on OUR dime. Oh, he can’t be bothered with what’s going on with ACORN, mind you, but he can press for Chicago to get the Olympics. So, General McChrystal, and our troops, can just wait, dammit, until Obama can get to them. (By the way, General McChrystal is holding firm on wanting those troops, despite the pressure he is under to shut up.)

Oh, and a little side note on that, the whole Chicago Olympics bid. Turns out that Fox TV in Chicago has been warned – as only they can do in Chicago – to NOT air a program they did on people in Chicago OPPOSED to having the Olympics there again. Oh, I just love this Free Speech, don’t you?

Every time I hear Secretary Clinton speak, and then President Obama, every time, I am reminded of who would have been the better choice to have at the other end of the phone line in difficult times. And it sure isn’t Obama, no matter how much he loves to hear himself talk (though largely about himself, as THIS article highlights. Almost 1,200 times in just 41 speeches, NOT including all of the speechifying he did last week. Holy SMOKES – narcissistic much?). He’s not the one I would trust to deal with the big issues. Seems like some other folks are figuring that out now, too. Too late, though, for dealing with some major issues, like Afghanistan.

If only it wasn’t our soldiers who were going to bear the brunt of that call going to voice-mail…

So, you can just guess how this went over when Obama and Paterson met on Monday up in New York. Can you say, AWK-WARD? I think this photo says it all:

I’m just thinking out loud here, but wouldn’t you think that the person whose job it was to get this, um, “hint” out there, that person, or someone else in the employ of the president, knew he was going to be SEEING that person like a day or two later?

Yes, “awkward” would be the word to describe it, as this article highlights,

Obama Arrives to an Awkward Hug From Paterson. Seriously – you’d think someone knew about this:

So what did he say?

President Obama walked down from Air Force One after his plane landed shortly before 11 a.m. Monday. He and Gov. David A. Paterson exchanged a brief greeting. They shook hands. Mr. Obama gave Mr. Paterson a half-embrace, then whispered into his ear for a few seconds. It was impossible for anyone nearby to hear over the roar of the engines.

The meeting, on the tarmac at Albany International Airport, was the first time the two men crossed paths since the news broke that Mr. Obama had told Mr. Paterson that the White House had lost confidence in the governor’s ability to win election next year and that he should abandon his campaign for the good of the Democratic Party.

Also on Monday, for the first time, the White House publicly addressed the issue of the president’s involvement in New York politics and did not deny that Mr. Obama counseled Mr. Paterson to pull the plug on his election plans.

“Well, look, I think everybody understands the tough job that every elected official has right now in addressing many of the problems that we have,” Robert Gibbs, the president’s press secretary, told reporters aboard Air Force One. “I think people are aware of the tough situation that the governor of New York is in. I wouldn’t add a lot to what you’ve read, except this is a decision that he’s going to make. The president understands the tough job that everyone has and the pressure that they are under.”

I am just so sure he does. And how nice of him to add to that pressure for Gov. Paterson. He’s a giver, that Obama, he surely is. That probably explains this:

The awkwardness of the moment was perhaps reflected in Obama’s body movements on the tarmac. When he went in for the quick hug of Mr. Paterson, he turned his back to the television news cameras, almost as if to avoid the taking of images that would show the two men in a warm embrace. The news crews said that Mr. Obama did not appear to be smiling when he turned around.

Mr. Obama moved on to greet others, but stepped next to Mr. Paterson to say a few things to the group of five or six people assembled around him. There were a couple of more pats on the back — Mr. Paterson on Mr. Obama and Mr. Obama on Mr. Paterson — and then it was over. Mr. Obama got into one car. Mr. Paterson got into another car. Plenty of New York media were on hand to visually catch the exchange.

The president was in town to deliver an economic address at Hudson Valley Community College in Troy. Mr. Paterson arrived at an industrial lab at the college around 11:30 a.m., before the president, and walked to his seat in the front row, just to the left of the stage where Mr. Obama spoke.

Mr. Paterson received light applause from the audience members once they realized he had arrived. At one point he was left standing by himself for about 20 seconds, while others around him greeted each other, his hands clasped in front of him.

Again, you’d think someone in the White House Staff might have known this trip was upcoming, especially since Andrew Cuomo was going to be there. That’s important to know:

A few minutes later, the state attorney general, Andrew M. Cuomo, and his entourage arrived. Mr. Cuomo is the Democrat many party leaders prefer as their gubernatorial candidate next year, believing he would stand a better chance of winning should Rudolph W. Giuliani, the former New York City mayor, decide to make a run for the office.

Mr. Cuomo was accompanied at the college by Senator John L. Sampson, the Democratic leader. After spotting Mr. Paterson, Mr. Cuomo gave him a hug, and the two chatted briefly and smiled.

Mr. Cuomo took his seat and socialized with local, state and party officials — at one point laughing so loudly that his laugh could be heard through loudspeakers set in the lab. He even waved at one point to the throng of reporters who were gathered around a set of bleachers next to where Mr. Paterson and all the other officials were awaiting the president.

Mr. Paterson, seated a few seats away, looked far more subdued.

The president began his economic address a few minutes before noon, after an introduction by Jill Biden, the wife of Vice President Joseph R. Biden Jr.

Mr. Paterson was seen playing with his mustache while the president spoke.

Mr. Obama had warm words for both Mr. Paterson and Mr. Cuomo.

“We have special guests here,” the president said. “I want to acknowledge, first of all, a wonderful man, the governor of the great state of New York, David Paterson. Next, your shy and retiring attorney general, Andrew Cuomo, is in the house. Andy is doing great work that has to be done.”

Mr. Obama left the college at 12:35 p.m and had one final brief exchange with Mr. Paterson along the rope line before leaving for the Albany airport. Mr. Paterson gripped the president’s hand with both of his. After leaving Albany, Mr. Obama was bound for New York City. (Nicholas Confessore reported from Albany, and Helene Cooper and Jeremy W. Peters reported from Troy.)

Oh, yes – I am sooooo sure Obama kissing up to Paterson, after basically telling him to get out of the way, is really going to do the trick. Yep – Paterson is probably all aflutter now that The One kinda sorta gave him a half hug, back pat combo something.

Did I forget something? I apologize, I sure did – when the White House tried to push Paterson out, you know what he did? He said he was running anyway. All I can say to Gov. Paterson is, Holla! A little shout-out for standing up to the pressure to get out of the way. Personally, I’m hoping Hillary Clinton will run for that seat, and no longer have to answer to Obama, but I applaud your tenacity. Well done, sir! You’re a brave man…

Um, it seems to me that if you happen to be the President of the United States, maybe you could appoint a Fact Checking Czar to go with the other Thirty-One – make a nice even number of it. I’m just saying – when you are giving a speech before Congress, televised all over the nation, it seems the very least he could do is MAKE SURE HIS FACTS ARE CORRECT.

Hey – maybe THAT’S when Rep. Wilson called him a liar! He KNEW Obama was lying about the cancer-stricken patient he was using for political gain. Just a thought.

Not for nothing, but they are using their own daughter to further this debate? Interesting. Funny how they don’t seem to make the connection that they are MILLIONAIRES, most people in this country are NOT, and the illness wasn’t serious (according to Michelle, anyway). Or that they both had jobs at the time – really, really, good jobs. Or that those jobs provided excellent health coverage, the very kind that 87% of employers would work to reduce if this Health Care Reform goes in as defined now. I know, picky, picky, picky…

Anyway, you know, there are plenty of REAL examples from which Obama could choose, I am sure, but honestly – why lie? ABOUT HIS OWN DAUGHTER? Is it just that he hasn’t met a truth he couldn’t corrupt? What’s the deal?

Oh, well. I am sure there will be plenty more examples to examine as his time in office goes on. But for now, I will leave you with this peppy little tune. I’m sure it will stick with you for the next 3 yrs and 4 months:

Um, aren’t these EXACTLY the same things OBAMA is planning on doing? Let’s see – he attacked Hillary Clinton during the Primaries by claiming she would fine people who didn’t have insurance. She never said that, but now Obama is. Obama claimed in the campaign that McCain was going to cut money from Medicare and tax people on their insurance, and now Obama is planning on doing both! WTF???

Oh, wait – Obama was emphatic with George Stephanopoulos that it is NOT a tax on insurance. Heck, no, no way, could this exchange make anyone think this is a tax:

OBAMA: What — what — if I — if I say that right now your premiums are going to be going up by 5 or 8 or 10 percent next year and you say well, that’s not a tax increase; but, on the other hand, if I say that I don’t want to have to pay for you not carrying coverage even after I give you tax credits that make it affordable, then…

STEPHANOPOULOS: I — I don’t think I’m making it up. Merriam Webster’s Dictionary: Tax — “a charge, usually of money, imposed by authority on persons or property for public purposes.”

You can watch the exchange here to get the fuller picture, and new definition:

No disrespect or anything, President Obama, but you make shit up all the time! Jeezum crow! And you’re going to get all testy with George? I reckon you forgot that you are trying to WOO people over to your plan, not antagonize them. Oh, wait, I forgot – this is upside down world. A world in which people who have the audacity to actually question you are rude, but one in which you can flat out lie about people who disagree with you. I got it. New definition of rude – check!

Well, that was the whole tax issue. How about cutting Medicare? Uh huh:

STEPHANOPOULOS: Let’s go to Medicare then…

OBAMA: Good.

STEPHANOPOULOS: …because you also said that no one will lose what they have. And Senator Bill Nelson, a Democrat, says that the cuts you’re looking at in Medi — the Medicare Advantage program…

OBAMA: Right.

STEPHANOPOULOS: …are going to force people to lose coverage they now have.

OBAMA: No. Here — here’s what’s going to happen. These are essentially private HMOs who are getting, on average — and this is not my estimate, this is Democrats and Republicans, experts have said — they’re getting, on average, about 14 percent more over payments, basically subsidies from taxpayers for a program that ordinary Medicare does just as good, if not better, at keeping people healthy.

Now, they package these things in ways that, in some cases, may make it more convenient for some consumers, but they’re overcharging massively for it. There’s no competitive bidding under the process.

And so what we’ve said is instead of spending $17 billion, $18 billion a year, $177 billion over 10 years on that, why wouldn’t we use that to close the donut hole so the people are actually getting better prescription drugs…

STEPHANOPOULOS: But Senator Nelson says it’s going to…

OBAMA: …Why don’t we make sure that we’re using some of that money to actually make people healthier?

STEPHANOPOULOS: But he said it’s going to cause beneficiaries right now to lose what they have.

OBAMA: Look, I understand that change is hard. If what you’re saying is that people who are currently signed up for Medicare advantage are going to have Medicare and the same level of benefits, but they may not be having their insurer get a 14 percent premium, that’s absolutely true and will the insurers squawk? You bet.

STEPHANOPOULOS: They may drop the coverage.

OBAMA: No, these folks are going to be able to get Medicare that is just as good, provides the same benefits, but we’re not subsidizing them for $18 billion a year.

STEPHANOPOULOS: So Senator Nelson, he wants to pass an amendment that shields anyone currently on Medicare advantage from any cuts. Do you support that?

OBAMA: George, I’m not going to be negotiating a particular provision of the bill, sitting (ph) down with you here right now. What I am going to say is this: the basic principle that is indisputable is that we are wasting hundreds of billions of dollars in Medicare that is not making people healthier. I want to make sure that we’re using that money to actually make people healthier.

STEPHANOPOULOS: But if people lose their Medicare advantage?

OBAMA: What I have said is we’re not going to take a dollar out of the Medicare trust fund. We’re going to make sure that benefits are just as strong if not stronger. We’re not going to subsidize insurance companies in ways that end up creating a situation that Medicare is actually weaker and has a less financial foundation, because right now, we’ve got eight years from now potentially Medicare going into the red.

If you get a chance, go watch the video. It seems to me that Obama gets JUST a tad testy…

One itsy, bitsy problem. The Health Care bill does say tax. Page 29 of the bill:

Excise Tax. The consequence for not maintaining insurance would be an excise tax. If a taxpayer‘s MAGI is between 100-300 percent of FPL, the excise tax for failing to obtain coverage for an individual in a taxpayer unit (either as a taxpayer or an individual claimed as a dependent) is $750 per year. However, the maximum penalty for the taxpayer unit is $1,500. If a taxpayer‘s MAGI is above 300 percent of FPL the penalty for failing to obtain coverage for an individual in a taxpayer unit (either as a taxpayer or as an individual claimed as a dependent) is $950 year. However, the maximum penalty amount a family above 300 percent of FPL would pay is $3,800.

And here’s a little bit of advice for President Obama, if it looks like a duck, and walks like a duck, it’s a safe bet that it’s a duck. But when the duck is clearly labeled as a duck (or in your case, a tax, or a cut in services, or a lie) it is a duck. So stop pretending a tax is not a tax, especially when it is labeled a tax. Just as folks understood that fellatio was a sex act they also are able to figure out that having to give the Government more money out of their pockets is a tax no matter what it is called. You may not understand what an “excise tax” is but some of us are actually able to tell the difference. But thanks for playing.