From Michael Ramirez:
(Click on the cartoon for a larger version.)
Until Hamas is willing to alter their charter, calling for the destruction of Israel, is there any reason to think they’re negotiating in good faith?
Following similar action in the House, the Senate voted (rather overwhelmingly; 90-6) to reject the shutdown of the Guantanamo Bay detention center. The Left has made this a drumbeat for years, but now that they’re in a position to actually do something about it, they suddenly get all NIMBY on the issue.
Harry Reid, the Democratic leader in the Senate, said that none of Guantánamo’s detainees should be transferred to the US to stand trial or serve time in prison. “We don’t want them around,” he said. “I can’t make it any more clear … We will never allow terrorists to be released in the United States.”
“Terrorists”? I thought they were a bunch of wrong-place-at-the-wrong-time, dragnet detainees that the ACLU is just waiting to spring. But now Harry Reid is calling them “terrorists”. Well yeah, that does rather change the calculus on the whole situation, doesn’t it? If we’d only known then what we know now, right?
And it seems most of the countries where Obama thought he could pawn off these “victims cum terrorists” are closing their doors, after saying that they would be open lo these many years. Apparently, they were “just words”. So now, Congressional Democrats find themselves between Barack and a hard place, a situation of their own making as their candidate campaigned on, apparently, “just words”, but no real exit strategy from Gitmo.
But Scott Ott, news satirist at his own site and now columnist at the Washington Examiner, “reports” that Obama has announced a new tactic; simply declare the detainees as “fetuses”.
While accused terrorists have access to attorneys, and nearly-limitless legal appeals, a fetus has no legal standing, cannot speak for itself, and is subject to the death penalty without regard to guilt or innocence.
Civil rights advocates have pressured Obama to follow through on campaign promises to shutter Gitmo, but even Democrats in Congress have resisted bringing the inmates to U.S. soil for trials and incarceration.
“We can debate whether enemy combatants have access to protections under the U.S. Constitution,” said Obama. “However, no serious person would grant such protection to an embryo or fetus. The loss of 240 fetuses wouldn’t raise an eyebrow in a nation where more than 3,000 of them hit the Dumpster daily.”
The president noted that America’s global reputation has been devastated by U.S. treatment of terror suspects, but that “our treatment of a million fetuses each year earns us nothing but admiration, and requests for clinic-funding from those who aspire to be like us.”
Sources acknowledged continuing White House debate about whether a terrorist who escapes from Gitmo alive can still be treated as a fetus.
Nobody, save for some right-wing extremists, could possibly object to that, eh?
From Chuck Asay:
(Click on the cartoon for a larger version.)
He’s just going to introduce efficiencies into the system, that’s all. No, really.
I’ve been light on the blogging this week (mostly copying and pasting) because my eldest is graduating from high school this evening. We’re turning a corner as a family; the first one to leave the nest on her way to college, and the changes in both her life and the lives of those, well, left behind.
It’s one of those events that is very happy and yet in a way sad. My mother-in-law said that she felt a sadness recently and didn’t know why. Today she realized it; she’s grieving. Our daughter is taking the first step to leaving our home, after having spent almost her whole life with us, and the absence will be definitely felt. Our in-laws live about 15 minutes away, and they see us quite regularly, once a week at church if not more often, so they’ll feel the same sense as well.
Yes, it is sad, but the joy in this time will overshadow it. The pride in watching our daughter graduate with honors (something her old man could never do) will push that aside. Having family and friends come together and celebrate this time will overcome any sorrow that the day brings.
I’ll miss my little girl as she hits the road and turns a corner to discover the next era of her life, in college. Yes, it is sad, but I’m excited for her. I remember this time in my own life, and it was thrilling.
Tonight, we all turn the corner, and we can’t wait to see what’s there.
Just ask California and New York. Attempts to balance the budget by taxing the rich even more has resulted in states in crisis. Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore, writing in the Wall St. Journal, have the details.
Here’s the problem for states that want to pry more money out of the wallets of rich people. It never works because people, investment capital and businesses are mobile: They can leave tax-unfriendly states and move to tax-friendly states.
And the evidence that we discovered in our new study for the American Legislative Exchange Council, "Rich States, Poor States," published in March, shows that Americans are more sensitive to high taxes than ever before. The tax differential between low-tax and high-tax states is widening, meaning that a relocation from high-tax California or Ohio, to no-income tax Texas or Tennessee, is all the more financially profitable both in terms of lower tax bills and more job opportunities.
Updating some research from Richard Vedder of Ohio University, we found that from 1998 to 2007, more than 1,100 people every day including Sundays and holidays moved from the nine highest income-tax states such as California, New Jersey, New York and Ohio and relocated mostly to the nine tax-haven states with no income tax, including Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire and Texas. We also found that over these same years the no-income tax states created 89% more jobs and had 32% faster personal income growth than their high-tax counterparts.
Did the greater prosperity in low-tax states happen by chance? Is it coincidence that the two highest tax-rate states in the nation, California and New York, have the biggest fiscal holes to repair? No. Dozens of academic studies — old and new — have found clear and irrefutable statistical evidence that high state and local taxes repel jobs and businesses.
And yet, as the article notes, some governors still listen to the siren’s song sung "by recent studies by left-wing groups like the Center for Budget and Policy Priorities that suggest that ‘tax increases, particularly tax increases on higher-income families, may be the best available option.’" Siphoning off existing economic activity is less useful than increasing overall economic activity.
The rich are able to move away because, well, they’re rich. They can afford it.
What does this mean for those states with low or no income taxes? Do they have to cut services, such as police and education? Some say they do, but…
They’re wrong, and New Hampshire is our favorite illustration. The Live Free or Die State has no income or sales tax, yet it has high-quality schools and excellent public services. Students in New Hampshire public schools achieve the fourth-highest test scores in the nation — even though the state spends about $1,000 a year less per resident on state and local government than the average state and, incredibly, $5,000 less per person than New York. And on the other side of the ledger, California in 2007 had the highest-paid classroom teachers in the nation, and yet the Golden State had the second-lowest test scores.
Or consider the fiasco of New Jersey. In the early 1960s, the state had no state income tax and no state sales tax. It was a rapidly growing state attracting people from everywhere and running budget surpluses. Today its income and sales taxes are among the highest in the nation yet it suffers from perpetual deficits and its schools rank among the worst in the nation — much worse than those in New Hampshire. Most of the massive infusion of tax dollars over the past 40 years has simply enriched the public-employee unions in the Garden State. People are fleeing the state in droves.
It only seems counterintuitive if you don’t understand that taxation changes behaviors. People avoid pain, and over time higher taxes are a pain. This will modify behavior. Penalize something more, you get less of it. It’s a human truism that the Left needs to learn.
Hugo Chavez would be proud.
A report Friday said federal officials are pressuring Bank of America Corp. to revamp its board and bring in directors with more banking experience.
The story in The Wall Street Journal called the regulators’ move "unusual" as the government does not own a stake in the company, and most of the bank’s problems are the result of its purchase of Merrill Lynch & Co., which was advised by regulators.
Bank of America said last week it was looking for new directors, but gave little detail. The announcement came as the government, after completing its stress test of the bank and 18 other financial companies, said Bank of America needed to raise nearly $34 billion. The bank has received $45 billion in government funds as part of the Treasury Department’s $700 billion financial rescue package.
The government is pulling the strings to change the makeup of the board, but it doesn’t even own any part of the company. There’s nothing wrong with a bank having more experience on its board. The question is, should the government be exerting pressure to do so?
For the first time since the Gallup organization has been polling this issue (1995), more Americans consider themselves pro-life than pro-choice, and the percentage of pro-life designations is the highest ever.
(Click on the picture for the source article.) Gallup calls this jump a "significant shift". Increases were found among the individual demographics Republicans, conservatives, moderates, Protestants, Catholics, men and women.
President Barack Obama, calling current deficit spending “unsustainable,” warned of skyrocketing interest rates for consumers if the U.S. continues to finance government by borrowing from other countries.
“We can’t keep on just borrowing from China,” Obama said at a town-hall meeting in Rio Rancho, New Mexico, outside Albuquerque. “We have to pay interest on that debt, and that means we are mortgaging our children’s future with more and more debt.”
Holders of U.S. debt will eventually “get tired” of buying it, causing interest rates on everything from auto loans to home mortgages to increase, Obama said. “It will have a dampening effect on our economy.”
How someone can first create quadruple the deficit of his immediate predecessor, and then say this is beyond me.
Let them brand themselves.
A member of the Republican National Committee told me Tuesday that when the RNC meets in an extraordinary special session next week, it will approve a resolution rebranding Democrats as the “Democrat Socialist Party.”
No, no, no, no, no. Let their actions speak for themselves, from purchasing interests in financial and auto companies, to ignoring bankruptcy law when dealing with those companies in order to pay off special interests, to spending billions (and taxing more) on universal health care, they can pretty much fill out the "Hello, my name is" badge themselves.
I’m with Michael Steele on this. All this will do is give the media and the Democrats a tool to hammer Republicans with. "They’re comparing him to Hugo Chavez" or something like that. While the truth is that they’re pulling us in that direction and not letting a crisis go to waste (as Mr. Emmanuel has declared), labeling them doesn’t change minds, or at least not for long. Pointing out why their policies are flawed will.
That’s the introduction from a Bible Quiz master in our denomination when he or she is about to quote someone’s words and is asking who spoke those words. So here’s a similar question for you; who said these words? One hint is that it’s from a category of people, not a single speaker. Another is that they’re talking about Arab extremists and our foreign policy towards them.
"Openness for the sake of openness makes the situation more complicated and sends the wrong message."
Appeasing extremists tells them, "that extremism is the most effective way to attract the U.S.’s attention, and to compel them to conduct dialogue."
When Pakistan was too soft on terrorists, the result was “more murders and torture of those opposed to the movement and more suffering for the people."
“Despite all [Obama’s conciliatory actions], violence has increased….None of these elements have changed their positions–despite everything Obama has done since assuming the presidency. Every step [Obama] takes towards [his foes] will only prompt them to challenge him."
So who said it? Neocons? The staff at National Review? Former Bush administration officials? A conservative think tank?
If you guessed any of them, the quiz master takes away 10 points for an error.
If you guessed moderate Arabs, you get 20 points. Barry Rubin has the details.
Back in January, the Obama administration put out a prediction of what would happen if the stimulus bill was passed and if it wasn’t. It was called "The Job Impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan". In it, they predicted that, while unemployment figures would ultimately recover from this recession, the stimulus bill would flatten out the peak they would otherwise reach. They even put in a graph to demonstrate their prediction.
Geoff, one of the many writers at the Innocent Bystanders blog, noted in April, and again last week when the April numbers were official, that the unemployment figures are precisely following the Obama administration’s graph of what would happen … without the recovery plan.
So we’re spending 3/4ths of a trillion dollars, and according to Obama’s own economic experts, the job impact of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan was nothing. But this is government, and no matter how poor the results, they’ll keep on doing the same thing; printing money, spending unlike any other time in history, and telling us that they know what they’re doing.
Oh yeah, and they’ll tell us to live within our means. We need an irony graph.
First off, Robert Gates says that the extended hand of friendship is being rebuffed by the Iranians.
He said Tuesday that so far, Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad’s response to the US outreach has been "not very encouraging."
"We’re not willing to pull the hand back yet because we think there’s still some opportunity," Gates said. "But I think concerns out there of some kind of a grand bargain developed in secret are completely unrealistic."
He was referring to speculation in the Middle East that the Obama administration was trying to forge a grand Middle East peace settlement with Iran whereby the US would press Israel to make concessions to the Palestinians, perhaps a Palestinian state, in exchange for Teheran rolling back its nuclear program.
"Not encouraging." Who’d have thought? (Well, lots of people, actually.) We attempt to give them what we think they want, and they turn it down. Perhaps what we think they want isn’t what they really want. Maybe wiping Israel "off the map" really is part of their foreign policy.
OK, but we’re trying, aren’t we? I mean, that must count for something in the Middle East, where Obama is trying to repair our standing among the Arabs, right?
Washington’s efforts to start a dialogue with Iran have sent ripples of alarm through the capitals of America’s closest Arab allies, who accuse Teheran of playing a destabilizing role in the Middle East.
The concerns being raised by Arab leaders sound strikingly like those coming from the mouths of Israeli officials.
"We hope that any dialogue between countries will not come at our expense," said a statement Tuesday by the six oil-rich nations of the Gulf Cooperation Council, who have long relied on US protection in the region.
Oh, well, so much for that. Extend a hand to an enemy, alarm our allies. Perhaps they just need to get used to the idea that making Iran a friend is in their best interest.
Or perhaps they know something we don’t know about Iranian foreign policy.
For a very modest definition of the word "trim". This administration has said it would be more fiscally responsible than the last, and then proceeded to put us into debt in a way never before seen. Well then, it made a promise about cutting the budget. So how’s that going?
President Obama has said for weeks that his staff is scouring the federal budget, "line by line," for savings. Today, they will release the results: a plan to trim 121 programs by $17 billion, a tiny fraction of next year’s $3.4 trillion budget.
About 1/2 of 1%. Well, one might say, that’s probably better than what Bush did. And one might be wrong.
The plan is less ambitious than the hit list former president George W. Bush produced last year, targeting 151 programs for $34 billion in savings. And like most of the cuts Bush sought, congressional sources and independent budget analysts yesterday predicted that Obama’s, too, would be a tough sell.
With a much smaller budget, Dubya found double the cuts he wanted.
But just because the President wants a cut, no matter his party, that isn’t the end of the story.
"Even if you got all of those things, it would be saving pennies, not dollars. And you’re not going to begin to get all of them," said Isabel Sawhill, a Brookings Institution economist who waged her own battles with Congress as a senior official in the Clinton White House budget office. "This is a good government exercise without much prospect of putting a significant dent in spending."
The problem is that our federal government is simply too big. So much responsibility has been given up voluntarily by, or taken by force from, states and the private sector, and once it goes to Washington, it virtually always stays there, where it grows and costs more money while becoming less and less efficient and nimble. Whatever the good intention, the more Washington does for us, the more it costs and the less anybody wants their piece of the pie slimmed. Consolidation of this power means lobbyists only have to convince a few Washington Senators and Representatives to keep their money flowing rather than legislatures in 50 states.
This is the result; a budget where only the most microscopic pieces can ever hope to be trimmed.
From CongressDaily:
House Appropriations Chairman David Obey dealt a blow to President Obama Monday by rejecting his request for funding in the FY09 supplemental spending bill to shut down the military’s Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, detention center by early next year.
The White House requested $80 million in the FY09 war supplemental to begin moving 240 detainees out of Cuba, but Obey said Monday he stripped the funding from his bill because the administration has not presented a plan to close the facility.
"I personally favor what the administration’s talking about doing, but so far as we can tell there is yet no concrete program for that," Obey said ahead of his panel’s markup of the $94.2 billion supplemental Thursday. "And while I don’t mind defending a concrete program, I’m not much interested in wasting my energy defending a theoretical program."
For dealing with these terrorists, looks like Obama doesn’t have an exit strategy. That "close Gitmo in 1 year" promise has only 9 months left on it.
I haven’t done this in a while, so I have some rather old examples in addition to the rather recent ones.
Signing statements: Once the bane of the liberal blogosphere, and criticized by Obama himself, they seem to be coming back into vogue. Perhaps not as much as under Bush, but when a spending bill’s signing statement says the President only considers some of the item "suggestions", that’s precisely what the Left used to decry.
Taxing health care benefits: During the campaign, Senator Obama criticized McCain’s proposal, but now President Obama is open to the suggestion.
Military tribunals: Senator Obama said during the campaign, "by any measure, our system of trying detainees has been an enormous failure." President Obama, however, is open to using that supposedly failed system. While this would be change a bit, sometimes using federal courts and giving foreign enemies constitutional rights, this is not making us friends in the world (as if that should be the ultimate end of our foreign policy). Germany’s "Der Spiegel" notes a number of German opinions that are critical of this move. And Moe Lane, writing at RedState, notes a plausible outcome of all this change; the status quo.
Mind you, other people suggested that the President’s actions back then [announcing the closing of Gitmo] were possibly just an attempt to give him maneuvering room while he came up with a way to keep the status quo going. Which leads to an interesting scenario: let us say that the President decides to run military tribunals for Gitmo detainees. Let us also say that he (with a little help from Congress) steamrollers over current opposition to those tribunals. Once those tribunals are done, and the existing detainees are processed… what’s stopping the President from continuing to keep Gitmo operating? After all, did he not just ‘reform’ it? It’d certainly be cheaper to keep an existing facility going than to shut it down and create a new one. Fiscal responsibility is good, right?
And what would any critics plan to do about it, anyway?
Vote Republican?
Not likely, so what’s the downside for the President?
