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TUESDAY,  MARCH 30,  2010

HAPPY DAYS ARE HERE AGAIN? – AT 8:18 P.M. ET:  Well, not really.  However, the Washington Post is suggesting that President Obama is back on track, fresh from victories, and dreaming of becoming the giant he knows he is:

On Tuesday, with audience members shouting "fired up!" and not a protester in sight, Obama signed a sweeping higher education funding overhaul into law along with the last portion of his health-care bill. House Speaker Nancy Pelosi (D-Calif.) and Jill Biden joined him onstage for what amounted to a Democratic love-fest...

...It may be too soon to tell whether the conventional wisdom -- that Obama changed the course of his presidency with the passage of his health-care bill -- turns out to be correct. But with its completion, finalized Tuesday, the president has finally turned to other things, and is allowing himself to enjoy the moment of triumph, albeit in his understated way.

Yes, understated and modest.  Just so modest.  Yeah, right.

"What has gotten overlooked amid all the hoopla, all the drama, of the last week is what happened in education -- when a great battle pitching the interests of the banks and the financial institutions against the interests of the students finally came to an end," Obama said. "This week, we can rightly say the foundation on which America's foundation will be built is stronger than it was one year ago."

Huh?  Can you figure that out? 

Actually, the student-loan reform program, inserted into the health-care bill, was probably a pretty good idea.  But what the president doesn't seem to get is that his methods are turning off many Americans.  There was no debate allowed over the student-loan reform, and even Dick Morris agrees that it will improve the student-loan program.  But members of Congress have the right to debate these things, to offer amendments, to enhance the final bill. 

We used to say, many decades ago, that Joe McCarthy's cause was right, but his methods were awful.  That was the rallying cry of the conservatives who eventually led the fight to bring him down.   The same can be said of Obama.  Sometimes we can embrace his goals.  But his street-style practice of politics is not helping his cause.  You can't put a halo over yourself one minute, and replace it with a dagger the next, without people noticing.  And people have noticed.

So, let the president have his moment of celebration.  But maybe it should also be a time for reflection.  He's president of the United States, not a ward healer on the South Side.

March 30, 2010   Permalink

THE IRANIAN NUKE – AT 7:32 P.M. ET:  In 2007, the CIA put out a remarkably misleading report claiming that Iran had stopped its nuclear weaponization program in 2003.  George W. Bush was in the White House, and the knee-jerk, everything-jerk anti-Bush press seized on the report immediately.  "Now they tell us," shouted TIME, the weekly viewsmagazine. 

A wave of contentment swept over many in the media, similar to the effect of a better-grade narcotic.  We had nothing to worry about.  The Iranians were just peaceful, good-guy Persians interested only in better production methods for colorful rugs. 

Saner and more mature observers at the time thought the report was a crock.  And, indeed, crockdom had reared its ugly head.  Now, though, sobriety has apparently returned.  From Fox:

A recently published report by the Central Intelligence Agency says Iran is still working on building a nuclear weapon despite some technical setbacks and international resistance -- and the Pentagon say it's still concerned about Iran's ambitions. The mandated report to congress reads, "Iran continues to develop a range of capabilities that could be applied to producing nuclear weapons, if a decision is made to do so."

"Iran continued to expand its nuclear infrastructure and continued uranium enrichment and activities related to its heavy water research reactor, despite multiple United Nations Security Council Resolutions since late 2006 calling for the suspension of those activities," the report says.

The CIA's new characterization of Iran's nuclear program stands in contradiction to the 2007 National Intelligence Estimate on Iran, which determined the country halted its nuclear production efforts in 2003.

The CIA report is unable to determine if Tehran has come to a decision about whether or not to build a bomb.

COMMENT:  I wouldn't get too hung up on that last paragraph.  I doubt if Tehran is putting all this effort into a nuclear-weapons program just to have the "knowledge" of how to build a bomb.  We have to assume they'll build one, unless stopped.  And there's not much stoppin'  goin' on out there.

March 30, 2010   Permalink

IRAN IS BACK – AT 7:22 P.M. ET:  Back in the news, that is.  Suddenly there are a number of stories about the boys from Tehran, what they're up to, and what we're (presumably) doing about it.  From ABC:

An award-winning Iranian nuclear scientist, who disappeared last year under mysterious circumstances, has defected to the CIA and been resettled in the United States, according to people briefed on the operation by intelligence officials.

The officials were said to have termed the defection of the scientist, Shahram Amiri, "an intelligence coup" in the continuing CIA operation to spy on and undermine Iran's nuclear program.

COMMENT:  Word of caution.  Intelligence agencies are trained to be very careful about defectors.  This may well be an intelligence coup.  We hope it is.  But a defector 1) can have ulterior motives, 2) tell interrogators what they want to hear, in return for a good deal, 3) may not know as much as he claims, 4) may have defected because of a grudge, and might give distorted information to get back at someone, or 4) can be a double agent.

But let's hope for the best with this dude.

March 30, 2010   Permalink 

POLL DANCING – AT 12:17 P.M. ET:  There were deep and profound predictions that President Obama would get a big boost in the polls once health-care "reform" was passed, and Americans understood the brilliance of the man.  Has it come true?  The Politico reports:

Democrats who held out hopes that President Barack Obama’s health reform win would mean a quick boost to the party’s political fortunes are getting a reality check – a reminder that it takes more than one good week to shake up a year of sliding polls.

Obama and his health reform plan did get a bump in several surveys immediately after the House vote eight days ago – but the numbers in some of those polls flattened out, showing how difficult it will be for Obama to capitalize on reform, even after his top legislative goal cleared Congress.

“It helped a little bit, but I think it’s within the margin of error,” said Peter Brown of the Quinnipiac Poll, which recorded a slight drop in disapproval of Obama after the bill passed. “The Democrats said the American people will grow to love this. We’ll find out. At this point, they’re not exactly jumping up and down.”

COMMENT:   I don't underestimate Obama a bit.  He's a first-class campaigner, if nothing else.  (Well, nothing else.)  But he won't rebuild his popularity on unpopular schemes.  I think what we're seeing in his failure to enjoy a sustained bounce is a certain skepticism toward the man personally, a skepticism that has grown as he's revealed himself to be a pretty conventional big-city politician with a silver tongue.  The halo is gone.  I think part of the trust is gone as well.

March 30, 2010   Permalink

OH, COME ON – AT 10:10 A.M. ET:  Related to the post just below, the Dems as the party of whiners, is the latest political assessment by the president of the United States:

WASHINGTON - President Barack Obama says he believes the Tea Party is built around a "core group" of people who question whether he is a U.S. citizen and believe he is a socialist.

Cheap, cheap, cheap.  Begin with a slur.  Question the sanity of the opposition.  Kind of reminds me of the way they did things in the old Soviet Union – putting anyone who disagreed into a mental institution.

But beyond that, Obama tells NBC he recognizes the movement involves "folks who have legitimate concerns" about the national debt and whether the government is taking on too many difficult issues simultaneously.

Gee, thanks, Mr. President.  We're glad you acknowledge that these American citizens have legitimate concerns.

In an interview broadcast Tuesday on NBC's "Today" show, Obama said he feels "there's still going to be a group at their core that question my legitimacy." But he said he didn't want to paint Tea Party activists "in broad brushes" and he hopes to win over members who have "mainstream, legitimate concerns."

Of course you wouldn't want to paint these folks "in broad brushes."  No, not at all.  Then why are you saying these things?

And, by the way Mr. President, why is it always about you?  There are real issues out there, and real worries, and not everyone wakes up every morning debating your "legitimacy."

March 30, 2010   Permalink

THE WHINING DEMOCRATS – AT 9:27 A.M. ET:  I remember the days when Democrats were seen as tough, thick-skinned politicians, many from the wrong side of the track.  No one accused Jack Kennedy or Lyndon Johnson of being wimps.

No more.  As Wes Pruden points out in the Washington Times, the Democratic Party has become a party of whiners.  Take a victory lap after winning a major fight in Congress?  Nonsense.  There's too much to complain about:

We're not yet a nation wholly of whiners, but some of our congresspersons are working on it. Democrats who should have been taking a victory lap spent a week cowering in fear of the contents of a tea cup. No wonder real men — mostly but, by no means all, white — are shunning the Democrats...

...Unless the president and his party find a way to reverse this trend they must prepare for an epic bath nine months hence.

And...

Accomplishing such a turnaround would require first of all for Democrats to pipe down about what a tough life they have. Life is real, often hard, and, as Damon Runyon famously said to a whiner at the poker table, "three out of three people die, so shut up and deal." Democrats in Congress who got their way in the health care "reform" debate are frightened now that the people they abused are angry and determined to do something about it. With the help of the compliant "mainstream" media, they have created the specter of a tsunami of hate, bigotry, racism, slander, rock-throwing, spitting, irritable bowel syndrome and seven-year itch. Sarah Palin has got the Democrats particularly spooked.

Finally...

What most Democratic whiners don't understand — and what some of their betters understand very well — is that people get mad when they're ignored and punished by consequences imposed on them. Barack Obama understands it, and is contemptuous of the backlash, as anyone knows who saw the curl of his lip and heard the disdain in his voice when he celebrated the signing of Obamacare.

The Democrats know they have shoved an unwanted and despised health care "reform" down the throats of Americans, and they understand that arrogance, like elections, sometimes invites consequences. Once upon a time the liberal establishment — now the terrified whiners — didn't have to worry about consequences, since it had silenced the great unwashed. But the unwashed have found their voice, and they're not giving it up.

COMMENT:  It's strange, but the Democratic establishment historically embraced the kind of people we find in the tea-party movement.  Or at least they claimed to.  As Pruden points out, they'd effectively silenced these people, often by handing out benefits and entitlements.  Now those very people have legitimate grievances, and the Dems don't know how to deal with those individuals.

Tammany Hall, the historic Democratic machine in New York, used to hand out Thanksgiving turkeys to keep the peasantry in line.  This year's turkey was the health-care bill.  Can't eat it, gotta pay for it.  The peasantry figured it out.

March 30, 2010   Permalink

THE CORRECT WORD – AT 8:41 A.M. ET:  Bernie Goldberg, who has become an acerbic and usually accurate press critic, had it right in a TV commentary last night.  He said that the behavior of the mainstream media has gone beyond bias and has now entered the arena of corruption.

He is correct, and "corruption" is the correct word.  The behavior of the press in the last week, in reporting charges against tea-party demonstrators, would have been enough to get a student expelled from any decent journalism school...at least at one time.

Reports started surfacing a week ago Saturday that some tea partiers demonstrating at the Capitol had hurled the "n" word against African-American congressmen walking past them.  One of the congressmen later charged that he had been spat at.

There was virtually no attempt on the part of the mainstream media to check these reports.  The charges simply went out, and what we saw was a major smear that would have made Joe McCarthy blush.  Even as a few brave journalists, mostly at Fox, dissected the accusations and examined the sound portion of videotapes made that day, the charges were lazily accepted as fact.  It was a sickening example of fringe journalism at its worst – destroying people without any evidence whatsoever.

No audio recorded that day picked up any racial slur.  The congressman who claimed he'd been spat at made a pseudo-gracious statement saying he wouldn't press charges.  But Capitol Police said they'd investigated and found no criminal violation.  So there was nothing to press charges about.

This is no longer bias.  This is corruption, a wilful portrayal of events that a press outlet knows is either wrong, or may well be wrong.  There's an old adage in journalism:  "If your mother says she loves you, check it out."  Today, too many stories go unchecked, as long as they support the prevailing party line.  Case in point – the early reporting of the Duke University lacrosse case, in which three innocent boys had their lives almost destroyed by false allegations of rape. 

I have no doubt that there are racists in a variety of political movements, and probably some racists among the tea partiers.  There are also racists on the left, especially in some labor unions.  But journalism, to win public support, must be based on fact, not assumptions or an accepted "narrative."

The mainstream media has been dying.  The Titanic captains among them keep convincing themselves that it's the internet that's doing it.  No, it's not.  It's a loss of faith by the public, and precious little is being done about it.

Don't depend on the journalism schools to help correct the problem.  They are heavily left-wing, and they are in the tank for the media outlets who hire their graduates.  They're silent when they should be shouting.

March 30, 2010   Permalink

ONE WEEK LATER – AT 7:55 A.M. ET:  You may have noticed what makers of war documentaries like to call "a lull in the fighting."  It's clear that many people in Washington are exhausted by the fight over health care.  The barbs are still being thrown, but little is really happening. 

For the American people, though, the worries are just starting.  A new Gallup poll, announced today, shows that, contrary to the liberal image of America, the citizenry is engaged, interested, knowledgeable, and concerned.  Who are these peasants to think for themselves?

PRINCETON, NJ -- One week after the passage of historic new healthcare legislation, Americans remain worried about the bill's effect on costs -- both for the nation as a whole and for them personally. A majority of Americans say healthcare costs in the U.S. and the federal budget deficit will get worse as a result of the bill. Half of Americans believe that healthcare costs for themselves and their families will get worse...

...These data underscore the results of previous Gallup research on healthcare reform legislation; costs have been the most frequently cited response when opponents have been asked to explain their opposition in their own words.

The public does not view all aspects of the bill negatively. Americans are slightly more positive than negative about the bill's impact on healthcare coverage in the U.S. and on the overall health of Americans in the U.S.

Americans break even in terms of whether the bill will make their and their families' overall health better or worse (although the majority say it will have no impact either way). Americans are more negative than positive when asked about the impact of the bill on their healthcare coverage and quality of healthcare received.

COMMENT:  You would think that, given the vast changes this bill will bring to American life, more care would have been taken to have the American people on board.  But the arrogance of the crowd running things in Washington never allowed for that.  Nanny is in charge, and nanny knows best.

It's worthwhile to read all the poll results.

March 30,  2010   Permalink

MONDAY,  MARCH 29,  2010

I WONDER WHY – AT 10:19 P.M. ET:  CNN is down in the dumps again.  The numbers are just not holding up:

CNN continued what has become a precipitous decline in ratings for its prime-time programs in the first quarter of 2010, with its main hosts losing almost half their viewers in a year.

The trend in news ratings for the first three months of this year is all up for one network, the Fox News Channel, which enjoyed its best quarter ever in ratings, and down for both MSNBC and CNN.

CNN had a slightly worse quarter in the fourth quarter of 2009, but the last three months have included compelling news events, like the earthquake in Haiti and the battle over health care, and CNN, which emphasizes its hard news coverage, was apparently unable to benefit.

The losses at CNN continued a pattern in place for much of the last year, as the network trailed its competitors in every prime-time hour. (CNN still easily beats MSNBC in the daytime hours, but those are less lucrative in advertising money, and both networks are far behind Fox News at all hours.)

COMMENT:  Unimaginative programming, a clear, indisputable leftist slant, and sometimes bizarre editorial judgment, are among the two to three hundred reasons that CNN is sinking. 

The network just got rid of one problem:  Ideologically obsessed Christiane Amanpour is heading for ABC, which frees CNN to make positive changes in its foreign coverage, if it wishes.

The trouble is, it probably won't.  CNN represents a point of view, and most Americans don't care for that point of view.

March 29, 2010  Permalink

ON THOSE LITTLE BLUE PILLS AGAIN – AT 7:01 P.M. ET:  She's back!  We did a post on F.P. (First Poodle) Hillary Clinton just minutes ago, reporting that she'd bashed Canada.  But now she's back.  What's Hil doing?  Why, naturally, she's giving a pass to China:

U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, launching a G8 foreign ministers summit on Monday, said the world could not accept a nuclear-armed Iran and that China could help resolve the impasse with Tehran.

Speaking at a meeting expected to focus on Iran, Clinton played down fears that China was out of step with the other permanent members of the U.N. Security Council on the question of imposing a fourth round of sanctions against Tehran.

"In fact, China is part of the consultative group that has been unified all along the way, which has made it very clear that a nuclear-armed Iran is not acceptable to the international community," Clinton told CTV in an interview.

COMMENT:  Oh, come on.  I mean, really now.  This is the trouble with this Obama crowd.  They believe they're so smart that they can fool all the people all the time.

China has made it absolutely clear that it will not go along with effective sanctions on Iran.  It has repeated that decision over and over.  The most we'll get from China will be some symbolic sanctions, which won't slow the Iranian nuclear program even a minute.

This is really pathetic stuff.  Our Iran policy has already failed.  Hillary should either resign or be silent.  She's embarrassing herself, although she had plenty of practice at that when she was first lady.

March 29, 2010   Permalink

SHOCKED, SHOCKED, TO FIND THIS OUT – AT 6:45 P.M. ET:  Detainees released from Guantanamo seem to be going back to their old specialty, as Fox News reports:

Prior to his release in December, Abdul Hafiz was Prisoner Number 1030 at Guantanamo Bay. Now, less than four months later, he's back home in Afghanistan and working for the Taliban -- just the latest of more than 100 released detainees who have returned to terrorism, according to the Pentagon.

Hafiz, suspected in the March 2003 kidnapping and murder of an International Red Cross worker, was the "Taliban head of all Madrassas ... responsible for recruiting and sending young men to fight for the Taliban," according to U.S. government memos. He was said to have maintained contacts for Mullah Mohammad Omar, the leader of the Taliban of Afghanistan, and to have admitted to participating in jihad against the Soviets.

But despite the list of charges against him, the U.S. government transferred Hafiz to his home country in December. And now, a senior U.S. official tells Fox News, he is back on the battlefield. According to a published report, Hafiz has been appointed by Mullah Omar to oversee ransom demands for kidnapping victims and to coordinate with nongovernment-aid organizations operating in the Taliban's areas of influence.

COMMENT:  Can you imagine if, during World War II, we released Nazi prisoners to go back and fight for the Fatherland?  Or even the small number of Japanese prisoners we captured?  (The Japanese did not readily surrender.)

That makes Hafiz just the latest addition to an increasingly long list of former Guantanamo detainees suspected to have returned to terror. The Pentagon, in an estimate issued in January, now believes that roughly 20 percent of the 560 detainees who were released from Guantanamo are back on the terror front lines.

American troops will die because the United States is releasing enemy combatants.  It is madness, utter madness, and yet it continues.

March 29, 2010   Permalink

DID SHE GET UP ON THE WRONG SIDE OF THE BED AGAIN? – AT 6:30 P.M. ET:  First Obama Poodle Hillary Clinton is at it again.  Her new target:  Canada.  Guess the Obamans didn't get enough of a charge going after Israel:

CHELSEA, Quebec - U.S. Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton criticized Canada Monday for not inviting all those with legitimate interests in the Arctic to a meeting about the region.

In her prepared remarks for an Arctic Coastal state meeting, Clinton said she had been contacted by representatives of indigenous groups who were disappointed they were not invited and that Sweden, Finland and Iceland — the three Arctic States not represented — had similar concerns.

COMMENT:  Are these Obamans on some kind of prescription drug that has bad side effects, like profound immaturity?  Is there an ally of the United States they like?  They've humiliated Britain, France, Germany, Israel, and Australia.  Now Canada must feel the wrath of the righteous administration.

I wish we'd treat our enemies as badly as we treat our friends.

What is our beef?  Canada didn't invite "indigenous groups"?  Huh?  International conferences are usually reserved for nations, with governments and capitals, and flags and stuff.  Indigenous groups?  Would that include, oh, Macintosh users?  The NRA?  Tea partiers?

Put in your demand today to be invited to the next international conference.  Just be really indigenous.  Feel it and live it.

March 29, 2010    Permalink

WHITEY DON'T PLAY THAT – AT 10:02 A.M. ET:  A new survey shows that the president is having a major problem with white male voters:

Millions of white men who voted for Barack Obama are walking away from the Democratic Party, and it appears increasingly likely that they'll take the midterms elections in November with them. Their departure could well lead to a GOP landslide on a scale not seen since 1994.

Joy to the world. 

For more than three decades before the 2008 election, no Democratic president had won a majority of the electorate. In part, that was because of low support -- never more than 38 percent -- among white male voters. Things changed with Obama, who not only won a majority of all people voting, but also pulled in 41 percent of white male voters.

And...

Today, among whites, only 35 percent of men and 43 percent of women say they will back Democrats in the fall election. Women's preferences have remained steady since July 2009. But white men's support for a Democratic Congress has fallen eight percentage points, according to Gallup.

White men have moved away from Obama as well. The same proportion of white women approve of him -- 46 percent, according to Gallup -- as voted for him in 2008. But only 38 percent of white men approve of the President, which means that millions of white men who voted for Obama have now lost faith in him.

And...

Most voters vote their interests. And many white men by the 1980s had decided the Democrats were no longer interested in them.

Think about the average working man. He has already seen financial bailouts for the rich folks above him. Now he sees a health care bailout for the poor folks below him. Big government represents lots of costs and little gain.

Meanwhile, like many women, these men are simply trying to push ahead without being pushed under. Some once believed in Obama. Now they feel forgotten.

Ironically, "the forgotten man" was once a Democratic rallying cry.  No more.

Finally, a word of advice:

But recall the Depression. FDR's focus on the economy was single-minded and relentless. Hard times continued, but men never doubted that FDR was trying to do right by them. Democrats should think about why they aren't given that same benefit of the doubt today.

COMMENT:  Because today's Democratic Party isn't interested in the working man, unless he's a member of some approved, "oppressed" group.  In fact, the party has contempt for the very people it claims to represent.  And those people have caught on.

March 29, 2010   Permalink

HE DOESN'T KNOW NOTHIN', AND HE DOESN'T WANT TO KNOW NOTHIN' – AT 9:22 A.M. ET:  One of the great myths about Barack Obama is that he's an intellectual.  He is not.  An intellectual is widely informed, is curious, is endlessly challenging his own ideas.  Obama fails all three tests.  He doesn't know much, doesn't seem to want to know, and hasn't exactly challenged the myths he lives by.

Oh, sure, he's "bright," whatever that means.  And he has some nice diplomas.  And he speaks well, although it's hard to recall anything he says.  (Compare please to Ronald Reagan.)

But in the hothouse atmosphere of the left, Obama's brain is a big deal. 

I've noticed that the left is concerned with two things – style and money.  Substance is way behind.  The left is comforted by the way someone sounds, whether he (or she) speaks in the proper manner, whether there's a hint of intellectual superiority, real or not.  Thus the left, in the 1950s, fell madly in love with a shallow governor named Adlai Stevenson, who spoke beautifully and had nothing to say.  I stood right behind Adlai Stevenson once when he was making a speech.  Eloquent.  Well phrased.  Can't recall a damned thing he said. 

Now, more and more people realize that we have the Second Coming of Adlai in the White House.   American Spectator has a piece that reports on one impression of Obama gleaned by businessmen visiting him at the White House.  The comment is by a representative of a corporation that had to take a big charge against profits because of the passage of Obamacare:

"Most of these people [in the Administration] have never had a real job in their lives. They don't understand a thing about business, and that includes the President," says a senior lobbyist for one of the companies that announced the charge. "My CEO sat with the President over lunch with two other CEOs, and each of them tried to explain to the President what this bill would do to our companies and the economy in general. First the President didn't understand what they were talking about. Then he basically told my boss he was lying. Frankly my boss was embarrassed for him; he clearly had not been briefed and didn't know what was in the bill."

Impressive.  Very impressive.  Of course, Rev. Wright never lectured on business economics. 

The problem extends overseas.  Our dear leader has felt...

" slighted" by European leaders and their staffs, such as French president Nicolas Sarkozy and German Chancellor Angela Merkel, both of whom have come away less than impressed with Obama's style and substance.

And those are two of the most pro-American leaders in Europe. 

Change we should never believe in.

March 29, 2010   Permalink

BARONE ON FOREIGN POLICY – AT 8:35 A.M. ET:  Michael Barone, one of the most astute observers of American politics writing today, adds to Steve Hayes's excellent piece (see just below), to point out that Obama's collapsing foreign policy consists of abusing our friends and appeasing our enemies.  How long will this disgrace last?

Barack Obama's decision to postpone his trip to Indonesia and Australia -- to a democracy with the world's largest Muslim population and to the only nation that has fought alongside us in all the wars of the last century -- is of a piece with his foreign policy generally: attack America's friends and kowtow to our enemies.

Examples run from Britain to Israel. Early in his administration, Obama returned a bust of Churchill that the British government had loaned the White House after 9/11. Then Obama gave Prime Minister Gordon Brown a set of DVDs that don't work on British machines and that Brown, who has impaired vision, would have trouble watching anyway.

And...

Some may attribute these slights to biases inherited from the men who supplied the titles of Obama's two books. Perhaps like Barack Obama Sr., he regards the British as evil colonialists. Or perhaps like his preacher for 20 years, the Rev. Jeremiah Wright, he regards Israel as an evil oppressor.

And...

In the meantime, Obama sends yearly greetings to (as he puts it) the Islamic Republic of Iran, exchanges friendly greetings with Hugo Chavez of Venezuela, caves to Russian demands on arms control and sends a new ambassador to Syria.

We haven't exactly gotten a big payback from Obama's lurch to the left in foreign policy:

And so Obama, the object of so much adulation in Western Europe, seems to have had only the coolest of relations with its leaders. The candidate who spoke in Berlin is now the president with no sympathy for the leaders of peoples freed when the wall fell. They are seen as impediments to his goal of propitiating Vladimir Putin's Russia, where Joseph Stalin is now an honored hero.

Obama's concessions to Russia have not prevented Russia from watering down sanctions against Iran. And Obama's display of scorning Netanyahu has not gotten the Palestinians to sit down face-to-face with the Israelis, as Netanyahu has promised to do.

Obama proclaims that through persistence he can make the leaders of Iran, North Korea, Russia, China and the Palestinians see things our way. The evidence so far is that they are making him do things their way -- and that our friends are wondering whether it pays to be on America's side.

COMMENT:  But think of the joy in the faculty rooms of the Ivy League.

Obama is the most left-leaning president we've ever had, and is even to the left of the flabby George McGovern, whose ruination of the Democratic Party is legend. 

We hope that a dramatic increase in Republicans in Congress after November will help to turn the tide against this presidential impostor.  If the GOP takes control of just one house of Congress, it can initiate investigations into our disgraceful, and dangerous, foreign policy, and start putting some real heat on our Looney Tunes administration, including First Poodle Hillary Clinton.

March 29, 2010   Permalink 

OUR IRAN POLICY IN FREE FALL – AT 7:52 A.M. ET:  Nothing is more important, and more pathetic, than our collapsing policy toward Iran.  The Iranians have won every round.  We keep making excuses.  Steve Hayes, in the Weekly Standard, has a terrific account of how sad things really are.  Just read this first paragraph:

On March 24, Obama administration officials briefed reporters on what was described as a very positive development in the U.S. effort to keep Iran from getting a nuclear weapon: China had agreed to participate in a conference call to discuss sanctions.

Yeah, that's right.  Our famous victory consisted of getting some Chinese official to get on the phone.  I'm blown away by our influence.

So here we are. After 15 months of pleading with the mullahs and entreating our allies for help, Barack Obama’s Iran policy is such a dismal failure that administration flacks are left to tout as a breakthrough Chinese participation in a phone call to discuss watered-down U.N. sanctions that few believe will work.

And Iran’s enrichment proceeds apace.

Do you get the sense that the president isn't really that interested?  It's hard not to get that sense.

In October 2009, Kenneth Pollack, a Clinton administration official and author of a first-rate history of U.S.-Iranian relations, said, “If by early next year we are getting nothing through diplomacy and sanctions, the entire policy is going to be revealed as a charade.” Plan B, Pollack noted, is “containment,” adding: “In their heart of hearts I think the Obama administration knows that this is where this is going.”

I'm afraid that's right.  We'll "contain" the Iranians, even though suicide is part of the mullah creed.  We'll be sold the line that it's no different from containing the Soviets. 

Well, there are two differences:  1) An Iranian bomb instantly makes iran the major power in the region, an overwhelming loss for the United States, and 2) Iran may just use the bomb, even if it means giving it to a well-controlled terrorist group.

But let's not worry about details.

John McCain, who's been terrific and firm on the iran issue, compares the Obama administration to another infamous government:

He said he had been rereading William Manchester’s biography of Winston Churchill and was struck by the similarities between the naïveté of Neville Chamberlain and the willingness of the Obama administration to accommodate the mullahs. “They’re just flailing. A few days ago the president said he wanted to talk some more,” McCain said, incredulous, referring to Obama’s message on Nowruz, the Iranian new year, which renewed the administration’s offer for negotiations. The overture, following Iran’s dismissal of several previous “final” deadlines for new talks, is “consistent with the thread of appeasement throughout history. It’s that same idea that if we’re nice to our enemies, they’ll do what we want.”

But that's what The One believes.  He believes in his voice, his words, above all else.  He believes he has come to save us.

Ultimately, of course, it doesn’t matter whether China participates in a conference call about weak U.N. sanctions that will have a negligible effect on Iran’s behavior. And containment, the de facto policy on Iran today, will become the acknowledged Obama administration approach to Iran.

Which means, of course, that Iran will have the bomb.

COMMENT:  Patrick Daniel Moynihan, the late senator from New York, once wrote an essay on "defining deviancy down."  He argued that, once we accept a lower standard in anything – like the rate of crime – we get used to it.  My great fear is that the American people will get used to the deviancy of this administration, its intellectual and moral corruption, and its adoption of 1930s-style appeasement policies.

Remember, troops will be coming home from Iraq.  That's something Americans like to see.  They may be fooled into believing that we're safe, that Obama is succeeding.  And they will be wrong, and their children will pay the price.

March 29, 2010   Permalink

TERROR IN MOSCOW – AT 7:40 A.M. ET:  There has been a new terror attack in the heart of Moscow.  From The New York Times:

MOSCOW — Female suicide bombers set off huge explosions during rush hour Monday morning in two subway stations in central Moscow, officials said, killing at least 35 people and raising fears that the Muslim insurgency in southern Russia was once again being brought to the country’s heart.

COMMENT:  President Obama has denounced the attack.  Isn't that precious?  I'm sure his ringing statement will deter the next one.

Once again we're reminded how vulnerable we are to a few determined terrorists, brainwashed in jihadism.  This attack killed at least 35.  It used conventional explosives.  Think ten years down the line, and what terror groups might possess.

Oh, by the way, Obama's statement reads as follows:

"The American people stand united with the people of Russia in opposition to violent extremism and heinous terrorist attacks that demonstrate such disregard for human life, and we condemn these outrageous acts."

Notice that there is no assignment of blame, no condemnation of jihadism.  It's just your usual generic terrorist attack.  Pretty typical of this new Washington crowd.

March 29,  2010   Permalink