Please note that you can leave a comment on any of our posts at our Facebook page.  Subscribers can also comment at length at our Angel's Corner Forum.

MONDAY, SEPTEMBER 6, 2010

OH, THAT OLD PROBLEM AGAIN – AT 7:35 P.M. ET:  You mean, we still have to deal with Iran?  Yeah, that's what I mean.  It's remarkable, but Obama's magic wand didn't do the trick, as The New York Times points out:

WASHINGTON — Three months after the United Nations Security Council enacted its harshest sanctions yet against Iran, global nuclear inspectors reported Monday that the country has dug in its heels, refusing to provide inspectors with the information and access they need to determine whether the real purpose of Tehran’s program is to produce weapons.

What a shock.  What a surprise.

For several weeks the Obama administration has argued that the sanctions are beginning to bite, cutting off Iran’s access to foreign capital, halting investment in its energy sector and impeding its ability to send its ships in and out of some foreign ports.

While there are strong indications that Iran is beginning to feel pain — largely from additional sanctions imposed by the United States and European and Asian nations over the summer — the report on Monday from the International Atomic Energy Agency indicates that so far they have failed to force Iran to comply with longstanding requests.

Which is pretty much what most sane observers predicted.

The agency protested that Iran had barred two of its most experienced inspectors from the country. They were barred only days after the Security Council passed its latest sanctions, part of a longstanding pattern of reducing access in retaliation for United Nations action. Iran has, however, permitted some other inspectors to enter.

The report also reiterated that for two years, since August 2008, Iran has refused to answer questions “about the possible existence in Iran of past or current undisclosed nuclear-related activities involving military-related organizations, including activities related to the development of a nuclear payload for a missile.” The report said it was “essential that Iran engage with the agency on these issues” because evidence can degrade with “the passage of time.”

COMMENT:  Boy, those hard-hitting comments will really shake up the mullahs.  Their turbans may actually pop off.

Iran remains the greatest foreign-policy issue facing us.  Some have concluded that it's an exaggerated threat, but it isn't.  A nuclear-armed Iran could dominate the Middle East and west Asia, and nuclear weapons, being small, are easily transported and could be given to trusted allies and terror groups.  Not a small thing to worry about.

We have made no progress with Iran.  That truth has to be faced.

September 6, 2010       Permalink

SNIPPET OF THE DAY – AT 11:44 A.M. ET: 

From the Detroit News:  Add Jesse Jackson’s ride to prominent vehicles being stripped in Detroit.  Following the embarrassing news that Mayor Dave Bing’s GMC Yukon was hijacked by criminals this week, Detroit’s Channel 7 reports that the Reverend’s Caddy Escalade SUV was stolen and stripped of its wheels while he was in town last weekend with the UAW’s militant President Bob King leading the “Jobs, Justice, and Peace” march promoting government-funded green jobs.  Read that again: Jackson’s Caddy SUV was stripped while he was in town promoting green jobs.

Well, to be fair, the stripped version probably is a little greener.  Give the man credit.

September 6, 2010       Permalink

IN EDUCATION, NOTHING SUCCEEDS LIKE FAILURE – AT 11:13 A.M. ET:  Next time someone appears on television weepin' and wailin' over "underfunding" in American education, please remember this story, about Los Angeles, from The Wall Street Journal:

At $578 million—or about $140,000 per student—the 24-acre Robert F. Kennedy Community Schools complex in mid-Wilshire is the most expensive school ever constructed in U.S. history. To put the price in context, this city's Staples sports and entertainment center cost $375 million. To put it in a more important context, the school district is currently running a $640 million deficit and has had to lay off 3,000 teachers in the last two years. It also has one of the lowest graduation rates in the country and some of the worst test scores.

The K-12 complex isn't merely an overwrought paean to the nation's most celebrated liberal political family. It's a jarring reminder that money doesn't guarantee success—though it certainly beautifies failure.

And...

Set to open Sept. 13, the school boasts an auditorium whose starry ceiling and garish entrance are modeled after the old Cocoanut Grove nightclub and a library whose round, vaulted ceilings and cavernous center resemble the ballroom where Kennedy made his last speech. It also includes the original Cocoanut Grove canopy around which the rest of the school was built. "It wasn't cheap, but it was saved," says Thomas Rubin, a consultant for the district's bond oversight committee, which oversees the $20 billion of bonds that taxpayers approved for school construction in recent years.

Can't you see the positive effect of this on math scores?

Talking benches—$54,000—play a three-hour audio of the site's history. Murals and other public art cost $1.3 million. A minipark facing a bustling Wilshire Boulevard? $4.9 million.

The Kennedy complex is Exhibit A in the district's profligate 131-school building binge. Exhibit B is the district's Visual and Performing Arts High School, which was originally budgeted at $70 million but was later upgraded into a sci-fi architectural masterpiece that cost $232 million.

Even more striking is Exhibit C, the Edward Roybal Learning Center in the Westlake area, which was budgeted at $110 million until costs skyrocketed midway through construction when contractors discovered underground methane gas and a fault line. Eventual cost: $377 million.

Remember, it's for the children, it's for the children.  Don't ask any questions.

The Roybal center now ranks in the bottom third of schools with similar demographics on state tests...

Congratulations!  Hey, it's better than the bottom ten percent.

But even though many Roybal kids can't read or do math, at least they have a dance studio with cushioned maple floors and a kitchen with a restaurant-quality pizza oven.

For the kids, for the kids.

Expect more such over-the-top and inefficient building projects in the future. Los Angeles voters have approved over $20 billion of bonds since 1997 and state voters have chipped in another $4.4 billion of matching funds. Roughly a third of the cost of the Kennedy complex will be shouldered by state taxpayers.

COMMENT:  And that, of course, is the heart of the problem.  It's OPM – other people's money.  I guarantee you that if the families of the kids attending these schools had been given a three percent hike in taxes to pay for them, the pizza oven would have never been ordered.  Let 'em eat cake!

Education in America isn't underfunded.  It's overfunded.  And when is someone going to start questioning the vast cost of sending a kid to college?  Oh, but we must not ask.  It's for the...you know.

September 6, 2010      Permalink

GOP ROMPS IN GENERIC BALLOT – AT 10:57 A.M. ET:  Scott Rasmussen reports a spectacular showing for the Republican Party in the Congressional generic ballot:

A new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey finds that 48% of Likely Voters would vote for their district's Republican congressional candidate, while 36% would opt for his or her Democratic opponent. The survey data was collected on the seven days ending Sunday, September 5, 2010.

This matches the largest advantage ever measured for the Republicans. Three weeks ago, the GOP also held a 12-point lead.

Still, while the margin has varied somewhat from week-to-week, Republicans have been consistently ahead in the Generic Ballot for over a year. During 2010, the GOP edge has never fallen below five points. When Barack Obama first took office as president of the United States, the Democrats enjoyed a seven-point lead on the Generic Ballot.

COMMENT:  Of course, the result comes from questions that usually begin, "If the election were held today..."  And, as some political wag once said, "If the election were held today, I'd be very surprised."

The key for the Republicans is to keep this lead through the real election on November 2nd.  There is some concern in GOP circles that the party may have peaked too soon.  However, experienced analysts point out that the summer before a midterm election is crucial, and that the party leading at the end of the summer normally wins on election day. 

September 6, 2010      Permalink

WELL, YAWN, MAYBE IT'S TIME TO DO SOMETHING – AT 10:32 A.M. ET:  The White House is rolling out some new economic proposals, having finally recognized that the old Democratic theme song, "Happy Days Are Here Again," isn't quite rising in the charts.  From WaPo:

Under mounting pressure to intensify his focus on the economy ahead of the midterm elections, President Obama will call for a $100 billion business tax credit this week, using a speech in Cleveland on Wednesday to launch what administration officials said was a new policy push.

The business proposal - what one aide called a key part of a limited economic package - would increase and permanently extend research and development tax credits for businesses, rewarding companies that develop new technologies domestically and preserve American jobs.

It would be paid for by closing other corporate tax loopholes, said the official, speaking on condition of anonymity because the policy has not yet been unveiled.

COMMENT:  I can't imagine this having much electoral effect, although a change of three points in many close races can make a difference. 

According to news reports, the Democrats are preparing to focus only on those races that they feel they have a good chance of winning, cutting loose, from financial and other support, marginal candidates.  It's a kind of political triage.  There is still a belief in Democratic circles, and we do not ridicule it, that the Dems can still hold onto the House, if only by a tiny number of seats.  If they do, of course, it would make Nancy's office plans so much simpler.  It's so hard to get a good moving company these days.  And as for helpful decorators, don't even bother asking. 

There should be other economic proposals later in the week.  Too little, much too late.  Voters want to see results, and even good proposals will take months to work their way through the economy.  The election will be held in only two months.

September 6, 2010     Permalink

SUNDAY, SEPTEMBER 5, 2010

THE UNIONS AND THE PEOPLE – AT 8:44 P.M. ET:  One of the most remarkable political developments of our era has been the drifting apart of many labor leaders from their own members. 

Linda Chavez, in the New York Post, does a fine job of analyzing what's happened...a development that has profound implications for elections, national and otherwise:

In a recent Washington Post column, Harold Meyerson quotes a member of Working America, a political group founded in 2004 by the AFL-CIO: "When our canvassers call on our members on their doorsteps, they hear Glenn Beck or Bill O'Reilly in the background." You can bet that drives union leaders crazy, especially since unions now spend a growing share of their members' dues trying to convince them that the likes of Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and Barack Obama represent their values and aspirations.

But workers aren't buying it. They've watched as the Democratic troika has shoved unpopular health-care legislation down American throats. They've witnessed unprecedented government spending that promised jobs but delivered nearly 10 percent unemployment. Now they're bracing for tax hikes, which they know will come out of their pockets even if the Democrats promise only "the rich" will pay.

Union households were a decisive factor in President Obama's 2008 election. The president won 53 percent of the popular vote, but that victory came largely because he won such relatively union-heavy states as Michigan, Ohio and Pennsylvania. But many union members who voted for the president and his Democratic cohorts in Congress won't make the same mistake again.

COMMENT:  I might add that union members are working people.  They and their ancestors built this country.  They're proud of it, and they see a Democratic president practically laughing at them as people who "cling to their guns and their religion."  They see others on the Democratic left oppose any American military action, action in which their sons and daughters gladly participate.  And they see a party run by elites who would never condescend even to speak to them.

And then the Democrats ask them for their vote.  It was a different party in their fathers' day, but this isn't their fathers' day.

But voters -- even union members -- won't be bought this time around. If labor unions ever hope to win the hearts and minds of American workers again, they could start by listening to their members.

Yup.  But they won't.  Too much trouble.

September 5, 2010     Permalink

SNIPPET OF THE DAY – AT 11:41 A.M. ET:

A major revelation this morning from the Associated Press:

DEMS' PROSPECTS THREATENED BY ECONOMIC WOES

I never would have known it.  Thank you, AP, for being on top of things.

September 5, 2010      Permalink

GOOD RIDDANCE – AT 10:57 A.M. ET:  In an otherwise reasonably reported story, The Politico makes a vocabulary error that is all too frequent in the mainstream media – the use of the term "anti-war" when a bit more detail is required:

As President Barack Obama formally declared an end to combat operations in Iraq this week, the anti-war movement that helped sweep him into office — and that worked for seven years to bring U.S. troops home — finds itself struggling for survival.

There is no "anti-war" movement, any more than there was during Vietnam.  The movement in that war was an anti-draft movement, at best.  And part of it was a "movement" by the old left, which was anti any war that America had a chance of winning. 

Today's "anti-war" movement is pretty much the same.  It ignores ghastly conflicts and horrible oppression to oppose any military action by the United States. 

Several factors — war fatigue; a deep, lingering recession; and the presence of a Democratic president they helped elect — have drained the energy from organizations that led the fight against the Iraq war. Some of the most influential anti-war activist groups that once summoned half a million people to march against the Iraq war and the policies of former President George W. Bush are straining to raise the money and attention to fight what they see as Obama’s military entrenchment in Afghanistan.

Influential?  Who do they influence?

“We don’t have a very vibrant anti-war movement anymore,” lamented Medea Benjamin, co-founder of Codepink, one of the anti-war movement’s most visible organizations. “The issues have not changed very much. … Now we have a surge [in Afghanistan] that we would have been furious about under George Bush, yet it’s hard to mobilize people under Obama. We have the same anti -war movement and not the same passion.”

Code Pink is a hard-left joke.  Its leaders were recently in the Mideast, ginning up anti-Israel activism. 

We've had, for half a century, these myths about "anti-war" groups.  They did enormous damage to our effort in Vietnam – a fact confirmed in North Vietnam's official history of the war.  Ever since the so-called "McCarthy era," mainstream journalists have been reluctant to call Marxists what they really are, and so a massive distortion of reality has occurred in the press.

The story goes on to quote the laments of one Leslie Cagan, another "anti-war" activist, and founder of "United for Peace and Justice."  The left loves labels like that.  Leslie Kagan is another anti-American activist who sells herself as "anti-war."

These groups serve no useful purpose.  They surround a big lie, and, sadly, the mainstream media has gone along with the fib.

September 5, 2010      Permalink

THE SKY IS STILL THERE – CHECK IT OUT – AT 10:30 A.M. ET:  Was that a hurricane that passed by the East coast, or what? 

We are regularly amused here by wildly exaggerated weather stories.  It's no secret that "the sky really is falling" stories are very good for TV ratings, and so we're never surprised by weathercaster hysteria.  In New York, in particular, snowstorms rarely live up to their advance billing, sometimes depositing a flake or two.

I recall one particularly hilarious TV report of some years ago, when a reporter, doing his stand-up from a shelter, enlightened us as to the "human suffering" of the storm in question.  In the background were some elderly folks having a grand old time at Red Cross expense.  I think there was some rain.

Hurricane Earl has now passed.  Did anyone notice?  NewsBusters reports on the off-their-meds coverage by the Boston Globe before the storm even arrived:

The Boston Globe, long notorious as promoters of global warming doom and gloom -- see Ross Gelbspan, for example -- sometimes gets embarrassed by the actual climate. On "The Green Blog," the Globe's Beth Daley projected that a "global warming double punch" could make Hurricane Earl much worse for Massachusetts -- except when it actually passed by, it turned out to be a dud for Bostonians and it could be watched on the coast with a glass of wine:

The large waves, storm surge, and flooding that Hurricane Earl will spawn as it strikes Massachusetts tomorrow night comes with an added dollop of trouble; Sea level rise.

Very gradual -- and in some cases accelerating -- rises in sea level off our coast over the last century will boost the height of Earl’s storm surge -- expected to be one to four feet -- meaning the wall of water will be able to travel that much farther inland and over higher elevations to flood basements, streets, and other low-lying areas....

As the great Jack Webb used to say, "The facts, ma'am, just the facts."

Obviously, we caution that many weather reports turn out to be accurate, and we should always heed safety warnings.  But, too often, the drama turns out to be much greater than the trauma.

September 5, 2010      Permalink

CAPTAIN SMITH, YOUR UNSINKABLE SHIP IS SINKING – AT 9:51 A.M. ET:  While stressing once more that daily tracking polls can be a bit volatile – see our final posting last night – today's numbers from Scott Rasmussen are the worst ever recorded for President Obama:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Sunday shows that 24% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as president. Forty-seven percent (47%) Strongly Disapprove, giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of -23 (see trends).

That’s the highest level of Strong Disapproval and the lowest Approval Index daily rating yet recorded for this president.

And...

Overall, 42% of voters say they at least somewhat approve of the president's performance. This matches the lowest approval rating yet measured for President Obama. Fifty-seven percent (57%) now disapprove.

Clearly, the drumbeat of bad economic news is taking its toll.  The president's widely praised launch of Mideast peace talks last week has apparently not made much of an impression on the public, which has seen many such launches.

September 5, 2010     Permalink