MORE OF THE SAME

It's really quite astonishing to me how someone can be so hypocritical, not only from speech to speech but within the same speech - sometimes even the same paragraph! But, I suppose I shouldn't be b/c President Obama and Gibbs have both done this repeatedly. The tendency seems to be getting worse. I suppose that's because he has to start changing his tone a bit if he wants to get anything done, but he wants to save face by somehow saying he's not changing his stance. In the end, he looks like a fool. Admitting he was wrong and approached things incorrectly would go a long way toward achieving bi-partisanship and trust from the American people (at least a bunch of them).

Again, I found this information off of a link from Instapundit:
ABC NEWS: Wall Street Bonuses President Obama Once Called ‘Obscene’ and ‘Shameful’ Now He Doesn’t Begrudge. Posted at 10:31 am by Glenn Reynolds

Highlights of the hypocrisy:

As recently as just a few weeks ago, President Obama called massive Wall Street bonuses “obscene,” language that fit right in with his previous descriptions for them such as “the height of irresponsibility” and “shameful,” an “outrage” and a violation “our fundamental values.”

And, then now,

I, like most of the American people, don’t begrudge people success or wealth. That is part of the free-market system.”

In context, this statement was attached to the typical cronyism and treating friends and/or his inner circle differently than everyone else,

Asked about the $17 million bonus given to Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co., and the $9 million bonuses going to Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of the Goldman Sachs Group Inc. CEO, the president said, “I know both those guys; they are very savvy businessmen. I, like most of the American people, don’t begrudge people success or wealth. That is part of the free-market system.”

And, this boggles my mind,

White House press secretary Robert Gibbs denied that President Obama had changed his tone at all, pointing out that the president has said "countless times" that he doesn't begrudge wealth or success.

Gibbs insisted that the president was not saying he doesn't begrudge the bonuses.

How can one say those two things simultaneously with a straight face? And, we've seen him want to poke his influence into football....now it's baseball, too.

Discussing the bonuses, Mr. Obama told the reporters, "listen, $17 million is an extraordinary amount of money. Of course, there are some baseball players who are making more than that who don't get to the World Series either. So I'm shocked by that as well."

And then, he says,

Back then, a White House official told ABC News that on the subject of executive compensation, President Obama told bank executives, “you guys are like overpaid pitchers on a team doing poorly. The concern is less when your team is successful -- but you guys didn’t win the World Series this year.”

I find that ironic because, according to his logic, he's getting overpaid, too. I don't think anyone could say that he's "winning the World Series" during his first year in office. OTOH, perhaps his is being consistent in his logic in his own warped way. Recall,

Asked about the $17 million bonus given to Jamie Dimon, the CEO of JPMorgan Chase & Co., and the $9 million bonuses going to Lloyd Blankfein, CEO of the Goldman Sachs Group Inc. CEO, the president said, “I know both those guys; they are very savvy businessmen.

These CEO's had to also be a part of the financial meltdown, but because he knows them to be "savvy businessmen", it's okay for them to get the bonuses. I have no doubt that many other of these executives are savvy businessmen too, but b/c he doesn't know them personally, their bonuses are "obcsene." I see the way he looks at himself is the same consistent, but warped logic as how he sees his CEO friends. He sees himself as smart and savvy and so for him, that's enough for accolades.

And going back to his indictment on baseball player's salaries, will he start to begrudge actors or actresses from getting millions and millions of dollars for a part, even if in the end the movie is a flop? I don't think so......their dollars and support to his causes is too important. Without those millions, they wouldn't donate as much. And, come to think of it, why in the world is he troubled that anyone is making a gazillion dollars? Those are the salaries that he's going to steal anyways.

I LOVE IT

This article made me smile. It's a great explanation of who the Tea Party is and isn't and why it exists and how it got its legs. It's worth a read, but I'll give you a bit of a taste with a snippet from here and there.

Upon his reaction to being at a Tea Party event,

And that grass-roots, “never-done-this-before” sense of excitement and empowerment is the first thing that really hits you. These are the most regular, decent people you’ll meet, and with very few exceptions not one of them has been involved in politics in any way. It’s just that — like so many of us — They’ve just had enough!

Regarding their temperament....first, who they are:

The people I have met at these events were generally the happy, decent, hard-working people that make up the vast middle of Silent America. They are not bitter, and they are not “consumed with rage.”

But they — I mean, we — are angry.

...and secondly who they are not,

"Of course, the media coverage has tried very hard to portray the normal, average, every-day Americans of the Tea party rallies as dangerous and angry racists and Wal-Mart knuckle-draggers, while identifying the mass-produced signs, the mass-produced T-shirts, the mass-produced members of bused-in wiccan nihilist anarcho-Maoist lesbian eco-weenie anti-war protestors as somehow the genuine voice of the American people.

Regarding the reason for their rage,

You want to know why we’re angry? What once was a social compact between the people and their representatives has rotted away into this: a people no longer paying a reasonable price for the limited number of things that only a government can provide, but rather victims of identity theft — people who open a monthly credit card statement only to discover fifty thousand dollars of vacations not taken, and jet skis and plasma TV’s paid for but never delivered. That’s why there’s a Tea Party..

They see the theft of our kids' and our kids' kids' wealth,

[They see our taxes as] their money to spend as they see fit — and not just all the money you send in taxes today, or next year, or the next ten years — they — Democrats and Republicans too — have spent all the money you will make in your lifetime, and then spent all of the money your kids will make, and the pool of work that your grandkids will do in 2060 or so — that’s mostly been spent too.

Regarding the reward of the work,

"Now, was Scott Brown the perfect conservative candidate? To many — even many who supported him — he was not. That’s not the question we should be asking. The question we should be asking — and did ask, it seems — is not whether Scott Brown is more conservative than Ronald Reagan. The question is whether or not Scott Brown is more conservative than Ted Kennedy or Martha Coakley.

He is, and by a very wide margin. That’s a win!

Victory is a ratchet. To retake this country we need every gain we can get — no matter how small — and to give up as little as possible. If Scott Brown — Republican senator from Massachusetts — turns out to be the most liberal man in the Senate then we’re living in paradise. That’s why there’s a Tea Party. And that’s why being a part of the Tea Party movement is, when it is all said and done, just plain fun."

And finally, how the movement got its legs,

"And a final note: do you know who we owe the remarkable success of the Tea Party movement to? We owe it to Rachel Maddow, and Keith Olberman, and Chris Matthews. We owe it to Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid, and Barack Obama — not just for the political motivation, but because they decided to make it personal.

By calling us Tea Baggers, and racists, and Nazis, and rubes, and hicks… by pretending we’re just a fringe group of dangerous radicals, or saying — as the President did, twice, and apparently with a straight face — that he was unaware that tens or hundreds of thousands of hard-working American patriots were clogging the streets of the city he lives in — well all of these geniuses poured can after can of lighter fluid on to what might have been some old, wet charcoal — nearly impossible to light — and turned it into a wildfire that will likely remake the landscape of this country. That’s why there’s a Tea Party.

For some, it's hard, due to the diversity of the effort, to nail down who and why the Tea Party is, but I think this article does that.

YOU'VE GOT TO BE KIDDING

The notes on Palin's hand "scandal" was stupid enough the other day. Today, Gibbs actually perpetuated itin a very childish way.

Gibbs Takes Swipe At Palin With Hand Note

CBS has an image up, saying the video is coming, soon. Tell me again who the childish ones are, here? About all this administration seems good for right now are the jokes, frankly. Maybe Gibbs should have written, "Get a job!"

Gibbs' move was a jab at Sarah Palin, who was shown to have written notes on her hand at a speech at the Tea Party convention Saturday after making an implicit criticism of the president for using a TelePrompTer.

Gibbs quipped that he had made the notes in case he and the press corps are snowed in. He said the words written on his hands included "eggs," and that he had written "toast" but crossed it out.

Palin wrote the words "Energy," "Budget cuts" (which was crossed out), "Tax," and "Lift Americans Spirits" on the inside of her left hand.

All I can say is, "You've got to be kidding."

REVEALING

Did any of you listen to the Katie Couric interview with Obama that interrupted the Superbowl pre-game? I hadn't then, but I just listened to it now.

There is plenty of fodder for someone like Glen Beck to pick up on that shows his true colors. He says stuff that he thinks sounds good, but it's full of more dictatorial and hypocritical rhetoric. For instance (my emphasis in bold),

KATIE COURIC: But did some of these special deals, Mr. President--
PRESIDENT OBAMA: They didn't help.

KATIE COURIC: --sort of get it passed at all costs, turn your stomach, too?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: They did not help. They frustrate me. But, you know, this is a democracy. Look, I would have loved nothing better than to simply come up with some very elegant you know, academically approved approach to health care. And didn't have any kinds of legislative fingerprints on it. And just go ahead and have that passed. But that's not how it works in our democracy. Unfortunately what we end up having to do is to do a lot of negotiations with a lot of different people. Many of whom have their constituents best interests at heart.

My reaction to those words is that he'd rather be able to impose his plan without Congress. That's what a king would do. But, at the same time, he didn't even send his plan to them to start with. Also, he's very aware of the deals and strong-arming that have to be done in order to get the votes. He knows that the bill doesn't stand on its own. Force and bribery is required. And here's another that is actually hypocritical in its own peculiar way:

KATIE COURIC Have you ruled out trying confessed 9/11 mastermind Khalid Sheikh Muhammad in New York City?

PRESIDENT OBAMA: I have not ruled it out, but I think it's important for us to take into account the practical, logistical issues involved. I mean, if you've got a city that is saying no, and a police department that's saying no, and a mayor that's saying no, that makes it difficult. But I think that the most important thing for the public to understand is we're not handling any of these cases any different than the Bush Administration handled them all through 9/11.

They prosecuted the 190 folks in these Article III courts. Got convictions. And those folks are in maximum security prisons right now. And there have been no escapes. And it is a virtue of our system that we should be proud of. Now, what I've also said is that, you know, it's important for us to recognize that when we're dealing with Al Qaeda operatives, that they may have national security intelligence that we need.

And it's important to make sure that the processes and procedures we approach with respect to these folks are not identical to the ones that we would use if we're apprehending the local drug dealer. And that's why we've put in place some very particular ways of dealing with these issues that ensure our security, but also still uphold our due process.

Does he realize his double speak? He says nothing has changed in the way things were handled in the Bush administration as though that is a plus. I thought he fervently thought that they did everything wrong in terms of these arrests. And, the presidency should not be "on the job training". He says the right thing, but then does another. They did treat the underwear bomber as we would a drug dealer.

I also can't help but notice his consistency in not caring about his constituents' or even sub-positioned authorities' opinions when he says,

I have not ruled it [holding terrorist trials in NY] out, but I think it's important for us to take into account the practical, logistical issues involved. I mean, if you've got a city that is saying no, and a police department that's saying no, and a mayor that's saying no, that makes it difficult.

Ah, too bad, it makes it difficult to work around the people's will. We see the same thing, of course, with health care.

I could go on making observations that come from reading the comments to this interview, but I think I've said enough for now.

TUESDAY

I'm still wondering what Iran plans on doing on February 11 to "attack the arrogance of the West".

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad says the nation will deliver a harsh blow to the "global arrogance" on this year's anniversary of the Islamic Revolution.

Perhaps this is a piece of it:

I read an from Yahoo! News, called, "Iran moves closer to nuke warhead capacity"

One sentence in that article says,

"On Sunday, Iranian officials said higher enrichment would start on Tuesday."

Tuesday is February 11.
Being humiliated is the same as attacking arrogance, right?

Tehran's enrichment plans are "additional proof of the fact that Iran is ridiculing the entire world," said Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak. "The right response is to impose decisive and permanent sanctions on Iran." "

Despite its efforts in diplomacy and sanction threats, the Iranians seem to show no intention of backing off. We have little recourse except to push for more sanctions. Israel will at least say so in bold terms. France and the US are more measured in their response.

Morin said France and the U.S. agreed that there was no choice but "to work for new measures within the framework of the Security Council" — a stance echoed by Israel, Iran's most implacable foe.

It seems only a matter of time before Iran has a nuclear weapon.

Although material for the fissile core of a nuclear warhead must be enriched to a level of 90 percent or more, just getting its stockpile to the 20 percent mark would be a major step for Iran's nuclear program. While enriching to 20 percent would take about one year, using up to 2,000 centrifuges at Tehran's underground Natanz facility, any next step — moving from 20 to 90 percent — would take only half a year and between 500-1,000 centrifuges.

Ugh. The world is so messed up. One wonders how it'll settle down. The Tea Party Movement gives me glimmers of hope that America will come around, but the the world is just so dangerous right now with weapons of mass destruction in the hands of so many unstable countries, not to mention other types of means to attain world domination. There are many fires simmering out there, ready to go ablaze. We've already seen some of the damage that can be done by these man made disasters. Unfortunately, they are a puff of smoke compared to the destruction that one can imagine in a pervasively nuclear armed world. Nuclear weapons may not end up being the weapon of choice in ultimately executing an attack (cyber attacks and financial woes could do the job just as well), but its threat in the hands of leaders who are crazy enough to use it would tie the hands of the civilized world.

AND THE POINT IS?

I found another article looking for ways to attack Palin.

Following is the text. I've put in bold the parts that make me say, "and the point is?" or "are you serious?"

Remember those quizzes you had on the state capitals back in junior high? Oh, the pressure! The temptation to write "Pierre, Olympia, Dover, Albany" on the inside of your hand was overwhelming, wasn't it? But you resisted. Maybe Sarah Palin should have done the same.

The former vice presidential candidate seems to have been caught using curious crib notes during an interview this past weekend at the high-profile Tea Party Convention in Nashville. While speaking about her top political priorities, Ms. Palin gazed at her hand in a rather suspicious manner.

Later, Web researchers zoomed in on her left palm and found the following words scrawled in black ink: "Energy, Budget cuts (with "budget" crossed out), Tax, Lift American Spirits." In an ironic twist during the speech, Ms. Palin worked in a jab against President Obama's often-mocked use of TelePrompTers. You can watch the clip below or check out a close-up here.

Following the flap, the Web went wild. Andrea Mitchell of MSNBC mocked Ms. Palin by relying on her own crib notes to recap highlights from Palin's appearance. Her keynote speech, it should be noted, had the crowd on its feet. "Run, Sarah, run," the crowd chanted (as in "please run for president in 2012").

But palm-gate wasn't the only bit of news sparked by Palin. Her defense of Rush Limbaugh's use of the word "retards" raised eyebrows, as well. On Fox News Sunday, the anti "r-word" crusader contended that Limbaugh had used the word in the context of political humor and satire. Earlier in the week, the difference between her angry reaction to White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel's use of the "slur" and a more restrained response to Limbaugh's made from some awkward fallout. Web searches on "sarah palin on fox news" and "palin limbaugh" have both surged as the controversy swirled.

Sarah's husband, Todd Palin, has also been back in the news. The self-proclaimed former "first dude" of Alaska was revealed to be quite active in state business. According to recently uncovered emails, Todd Palin was "involved in a judicial appointment, monitored contract negotiations with public employee unions, received background checks on a corporate CEO, added his approval or disapproval to state board appointments and passed financial information marked 'confidential' from his oil company employer to a state attorney."

Is it only me that thinks people are making fools of themselves pointing out these petty and often irrelevant things? I mean really. Crib notes? Husband active in state business? Is that all they can come up with? They must be pretty desperate. Notice that it says, "according to recently uncovered e-mails". That means that they've been digging for something juicy. Considering the things the MSM has ignored over the past couple of years, it's hard to believe they're making such a big deal about something so silly.

JUST FOR SHOW

It seems that the only thing the Obama Administration has learned is that they have to appear to be seeking the GOP's ideas on health care reform. I think William A. Jefferson's blog post at Le-gal In-sur-rec-tion makes a very good point. Following are his comments:

Monday, February 8, 2010
Negotiations Without Preconditions for Iran, But Not Republicans
Barack Obama was steadfast during the campaign and after his election in his willingness to enter into negotiations with Iran without preconditions.

But Obama is not willing to enter into health care negotiations with Republicans without preconditions.

In inviting Republicans to the negotiating table for the first time later this month, Obama has imposed the precondition that the negotiations start with the Democratic versions of health care legislation:

White House aides quickly rejected the idea that Obama wants to start over after nearly a year of contentious legislative haggling among members of his party.

Officials said the president will come to the health-care summit armed with a merged version of the two bills that Democrats strong-armed through the two chambers with almost no GOP backing.

"This is not starting over," one White House official said, who requested anonymity in order to discuss administration strategy. "Don't make any mistake about that. We are coming with our plan. They can bring their plan."

The official added: "What the president will not do is let this moment slip away. He hopes to have Republican support in doing so -- but he is going to move forward on health reform."

Obama's plan seems to be tweaks, at most, to otherwise unpopular and disastrous legislation, so that Republicans can share the blame in voters' eyes.

Put lipstick on Democrats' legislative pig. That is an easy offer to refuse.

Negotiations without preconditions. That would be the place to start.