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That's the same stupid argument used 10 years ago
Well, it'll take 10 years for the oil to come on line. it won't affect prices, blab blah blah
Do you really think that if there was increased supply now from wells they started ten years ago the situation wouldn't be better??
Supply and demand- is that so hard a concept?
POTENTIAL COMMANDER-"OF"-CHIEF AVOIDS MILITARY: We'd like to know what incredibly important event Barack Obama has scheduled on August 11 that prevents him from participating in a debate at Texas' Fort Hood. The townhall event, sponsored by an array of military support groups, hopes to offer the 6,000-strong audience (predominantly veterans and military families) an opportunity to directly question their next commander-in-chief. John McCain is ready and willing, but so far the Obama just can't find an opening. We wonder what scares him most -- a face-to-face matchup with McCain, potential heckles, or simply not being in front of his customary mass gathering of zombies. Whatever the explanation, Obama looks weak in front an audience that needs to respect him as their commander. Not a good start.
No one said it was a policy, but it is the thing we can do now that should have an immediate impact on prices
OF course it is a stop gap, but I feel confident that market forces will provide solutions- its jut that they are a ways off- probably 4-5 years at he earliest
It's not putting anything off- it's dealing with reality. Unless you're advocating a world wide economic slowdown, oil will need to be supplied in increasing amounts for at least 5 years
Even a few republicans have noticed the price of gasoline
Yep, like Bush who just rescinded the ban on off shore drilling
Now, we;ll be able to drill right alongside the other nations who are doing it already
Peggie just bots on- doesn't let the FACTS get in the way
PS, I love that we're on the same side in seeing the dangers of a Barry presidency
Pay attention pegbot.
Remember that McCain already asked for a series of 10 town hall debates
Barry, after first welcoming foreign policy debates has now run and hid
Obama on Jerusalem -- dishonest, ignorant, or both
As with virtually every other issue of consequence, Barack Obama has failed to take a consistent, coherent position with respect to his goal for the city of Jerusalem. A few months ago, when he was pandering to the pro-Israel audience at AIPAC, Obama said that Jerusalem should remain “undivided.” For those with a basic understanding of the discourse on this issue, the meaning of his statement was clear -- Jerusalem will remain the Jewish people’s historical capital city and will remain exclusively part of the Jewish state under any future agreement with the Palestinians.
Obama, moreover, had plenty of incentive to convey this position to the AIPAC convention. Indeed, any other descripton of the future of Jerusalem would have played poorly with an audience Obama very much wanted to impress.
However, Obama's handlers were uncomfortable with Obama's statement because the call for an undivided city might “prejudice” the “final status” of Jerusalem. The party line among mainstream advocates of the "peace process" is to call on Israel and the Palestinians negotiate without such preconditions, with the "final status" of Jerusalem to be resolved at the end of the process.
With the AIPAC convention behind him, Obama has fallen back to the party line. Attempting to "clarify" his "poorly phrased" remarks to the pro-Israel crowd, Obama now says:
The point we were simply making was that we don't want barbed wire running through Jerusalem, similar to the way it was prior to the '67 war, that it is possible for us to create a Jerusalem that is cohesive and coherent. I was not trying to predetermine what are essentially final-status issues.
But that is an easy point to make. If this is what Obama wanted to convey to AIPAC, it's difficult to believe he would have used the loaded term "undivided."
But what of Obama's current vision under which Mr. Yes-We-Can resolves to "create a Jerusalem that is cohesive and coherent" that it is not exclusively part of a Jewish state but requires no barriers? The question answers itself. Here's how David Hazony, a resident of Jerusalem, puts it:
What could it possibly mean to want a “coherent” city that is the capital of two different countries, one of which has been teaching its entire population to hate the other and commit suicide bombings in its restaurants for 15 years now — and all this without a proper border? I live in Jerusalem. The border between Israel and the Palestinians, wherever it may run, and no matter how long peace reigns, will never be like that between Massachusetts and Connecticut. It is unlikely ever even to be like the one between Arizona and Mexico. If there is ever a division of Jerusalem, there will be more than just barbed wire separating the two halves of the city. We are talking about different worlds entirely, and security arrangements will reflect this.
As Hazony concludes, Obama either understands this or he doesn't. If he does, he is being dishonest when he claim the city can be undivided in other than the sense in which his AIPAC remarks were construed. If he doesn't, his ignorance is staggering.
Yep, remember Barry's wanting a series of foreign policy debates??
OOOPS
McCain should pound him repeatedly on his fear of face to face debates
I blame the Republicans
Posted by: McQ
Willem Buiter of the Financial Times does a pretty good job of laying out the Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae debacle. I don't necessarily agree with his solutions, but he does hit the high points as to why they're in trouble.
What I found much more interesting than his description and his solutions was this passage hinted at in his title:
There are many forms of socialism. The version practiced in the US is the most deceitful one I know. An honest, courageous socialist government would say: this is a worthwhile social purpose (financing home ownership, helping my friends on Wall Street); therefore I am going to subsidize it; and here are the additional taxes (or cuts in other public spending) to finance it.
Instead the dishonest, spineless socialist policy makers in successive Democratic and Republican administrations have systematically tried to hide both the subsidies and size and distribution of the incremental fiscal burden associated with the provision of these subsidies, behind an endless array of opaque arrangements and institutions. Off-balance-sheet vehicles and off-budget financing were the bread and butter of the US federal government long before they became popular in Wall Street and the City of London.
He nails it. And he properly nails both Democrats and Republicans as well. But as far as I'm concerned, it is Republicans and Republican administrations which deserve the lion's share of the blame. It isn't a secret that Democrats are far too comfortable with moving us toward socialism and if you listen to Barack Obama, such a desire is plainly evident when he gives any specificity to his usual generalizations.
However it is Republicans who, over the years, have bought into the socialist premises which have led to the existence of such institutions. It is their complicity through the decades that have ensured not only their implementation, but their survival.
You can't fault a dog when it acts like a dog. Democrats pushing socialism are Democrats acting naturally. But Republicans, given their rhetoric and supposed principles, don't have that excuse at all. In reality their problem has been lack of will, lack of spine and lack of principles. Or at least the principles they've claimed for at least a century.
Now, again, we see something government initiated, cobbled together and promised to oversee teetering and creaking and making noises that sound like collapse. And the solution?
Why more government of course - and more of your money.
Enjoy.
AGW: Short on science, long on religion
Posted by: McQ
His name is James A. Peden, he's the Editor of the Middlebury Community Network. He also spent some of his earlier years as an Atmospheric Physicist at the Space Research and Coordination Center in Pittsburgh and Extranuclear Laboratories in Blawnox, Pennsylvania, studying ion-molecule reactions in the upper atmosphere.
About CO2 and AGW? He's not particularly impressed with the arguments put forward by the AGW crowd:
As a dissenting physicist, I simply can no longer buy the notion that CO2 produces any significant warming of the atmosphere at any rate. I've studied the atomic absorption physics to death, from John Nicol's extensive development to the much longer winded dissertation by Gerlich & Tscheuschner and everything in between, it simply doesn't add up. Even if every single IR photon absorbed by a CO2 molecule were magically transformed into purely thermal translational modes , the pitifully small quantity of CO2 in the atmosphere doesn't add up to much additional heat. And if the aforementioned magical 100% transformation from radiation into "heat" were true, then all arguments concerning re-emission ( source of all the wonderful "greenhouse effect" cartoons with their arrows flying in all directions ) are out the window.
More and more, I am becoming convinced that atmospheric heating is primarily by thermal conduction from the surface, whose temperature is determined primarily by solar absorption. I get a lot of email from laymen seeking simple answers. My simple reply goes like this:
1. The sun heats the earth.
2. The earth heats the atmosphere
3. After the sun sets, the atmosphere cools back down
With a parting comment: "If we were to have 96 continuous hours without sunlight, temperatures would likely be below freezing over all the world's land masses. The warmest place you could find would be to take a swim in the nearest ocean. There is no physical process in the atmosphere which "traps" heat. The so-called "greenhouse effect " is a myth.
His is one of the more extensive and readable critiques (hit the link) I've found. It goes to the heart of the AGW argument and pretty much demolishes it.
Near the end he summarizes with a pretty complete (and compelling) list:
1. The "Greenhouse Effect" is a natural and valuable phenomenon, without which, the planet would be uninhabitable.
2. Modest Global Warming, at least up until 1998 when a cooling trend began, has been real.
3. CO2 is not a significant greenhouse gas; 95% of the contribution is due to Water Vapor.
4. Man's contribution to Greenhouse Gasses is relatively insignificant. We didn't cause the recent Global Warming and we cannot stop it.
5. Solar Activity appears to be the principal driver for Climate Change, accompanied by complex ocean currents which distribute the heat and control local weather systems.
6. CO2 is a useful trace gas in the atmosphere, and the planet would actually benefit by having more, not less of it, because it is not a driver for Global Warming and would enrich our vegetation, yielding better crops to feed the expanding population.
7. CO2 is not causing global warming, in fact, CO2 is lagging temperature change in all reliable datasets. The cart is not pulling the donkey, and the future cannot influence the past.
8. Nothing happening in the climate today is particularly unusual, and in fact has happened many times in the past and will likely happen again in the future.
9. The UN IPCC has corrupted the "reporting process" so badly, it makes the oil-for-food scandal look like someone stole some kid's lunch money. They do not follow the Scientific Method, and modify the science as needed to fit their predetermined conclusions. In empirical science, one does NOT write the conclusion first, then solicit "opinion" on the report, ignoring any opinion which does not fit their predetermined conclusion while falsifying data to support unrealistic models.
10. Polar Bear populations are not endangered, in fact current populations are healthy and at almost historic highs. The push to list them as endangered is an effort to gain political control of their habitat... particularly the North Slope oil fields.
11. There is no demonstrated causal relationship between hurricanes and/or tornadoes and global warming. This is sheer conjecture totally unsupported by any material science.
12. Observed glacial retreats in certain select areas have been going on for hundreds of years, and show no serious correlation to short-term swings in global temperatures.
13. Greenland is shown to be an island completely surrounded by water, not ice, in maps dating to the 14th century. There is active geothermal activity in the currently "melting" sections of Greenland.
14. The Antarctic Ice cover is currently the largest ever observed by satellite, and periodic ice shelf breakups are normal and correlate well with localized tectonic and geothermal activity along the Antarctic Peninsula.
15. The Global Warming Panic was triggered by an artifact of poor mathematics which has been thoroughly disproved. The panic is being deliberately nurtured by those who stand to gain both financially and politically from perpetuation of the hoax.
16. Scientists who "deny" the hoax are often threatened with loss of funding or even their jobs.
17. The correlation between solar activity and climate is now so strong that solar physicists are now seriously discussing the much greater danger of pending global cooling.
18. Biofuel hysteria is already having a disastrous effect on world food supplies and prices, and current technologies for biofuel production consume more energy than the fuels produce.
19. Global Warming Hysteria is potentially linked to a stress-induced mental disorder.
20. In short, there is no "climate crisis" of any kind at work on our planet.
When you read and consider what Peden has persuasively argued it's hard not to be very skeptical of the "science" in the argument the AGW crowd continues to stand by. And you wonder why they remain so dismissively adamant about that position in the face of this convincing dissent?
That is until you realize, as Freeman Dyson (a professor of physics at the Institute for Advanced Study in Princeton) has, that it has become a religion for many of those involved. It has to do with shifting allegiance from one dogma to another. Interestingly, Dyson discovered this while writing 2 book reviews for the New York Times Review of Books.
Upon finishing his reviews he says:
All the books that I have seen about the science and economics of global warming, including the two books under review, miss the main point. The main point is religious rather than scientific. There is a worldwide secular religion which we may call environmentalism, holding that we are stewards of the earth, that despoiling the planet with waste products of our luxurious living is a sin, and that the path of righteousness is to live as frugally as possible. The ethics of environmentalism are being taught to children in kindergartens, schools, and colleges all over the world.
Environmentalism has replaced socialism as the leading secular religion. And the ethics of environmentalism are fundamentally sound. Scientists and economists can agree with Buddhist monks and Christian activists that ruthless destruction of natural habitats is evil and careful preservation of birds and butterflies is good. The worldwide community of environmentalists-most of whom are not scientists-holds the moral high ground, and is guiding human societies toward a hopeful future. Environmentalism, as a religion of hope and respect for nature, is here to stay. This is a religion that we can all share, whether or not we believe that global warming is harmful.
Unfortunately, some members of the environmental movement have also adopted as an article of faith the belief that global warming is the greatest threat to the ecology of our planet. That is one reason why the arguments about global warming have become bitter and passionate. Much of the public has come to believe that anyone who is skeptical about the dangers of global warming is an enemy of the environment. The skeptics now have the difficult task of convincing the public that the opposite is true. Many of the skeptics are passionate environmentalists. They are horrified to see the obsession with global warming distracting public attention from what they see as more serious and more immediate dangers to the planet, including problems of nuclear weaponry, environmental degradation, and social injustice. Whether they turn out to be right or wrong, their arguments on these issues deserve to be heard.
And real scientists would certainly want to hear them, wouldn't they. But the AGW crowd has adopted the secular version of the bumper sticker by which they love to deride Christians as unthinking automotons: "God wrote it, I believe it and that ends it".
Dyson, who is a fellow of the Royal Society of London, which is like our National Academy of Science (of which he is also a member), chides the Royal Society for adopting precisely that attitude - a secular version of the very same bumper sticker.
The last five chapters of the Zedillo book are by writers from five of the countries most concerned with the politics of global warming: Russia, Britain, Canada, India, and China. Each of the five authors has been responsible for giving technical advice to a government, and each of them gives us a statement of that government's policy. Howard Dalton, spokesman for the British government, is the most dogmatic. His final paragraph begins:
It is the firm view of the United Kingdom that climate change constitutes a major threat to the environment and human society, that urgent action is needed now across the world to avert that threat, and that the developed world needs to show leadership in tackling climate change.
The United Kingdom has made up its mind and takes the view that any individuals who disagree with government policy should be ignored. This dogmatic tone is also adopted by the Royal Society, the British equivalent of the US National Academy of Sciences. The Royal Society recently published a pamphlet addressed to the general public with the title "Climate Change Controversies: A Simple Guide." The pamphlet says:
This is not intended to provide exhaustive answers to every contentious argument that has been put forward by those who seek to distort and undermine the science of climate change and deny the seriousness of the potential consequences of global warming.
In other words, if you disagree with the majority opinion about global warming, you are an enemy of science. The authors of the pamphlet appear to have forgotten the ancient motto of the Royal Society, Nullius in Verba, which means, "Nobody's word is final."
Very little irony here, is there?
Obama's Jerusalem Flip-Flop Now Complete
Sun, Jul 13, 2008 at 12:46:01 pm PDT
Yet another major policy reversal for Barack Obama, and again he’s blaming it on “poor phrasing.”
He’s very obviously giving in to the enormous pressure from pro-Palestinian groups.
WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Democratic presidential hopeful Barack Obama said on Sunday he used “poor phrasing” in a speech supporting Jerusalem as the undivided capital of Israel.
“You know, the truth is that this was an example where we had some poor phrasing in the speech. And we immediately tried to correct the interpretation that was given,” he said in an interview aired on Sunday on CNN’s “Fareed Zakaria — GPS.”
“The point we were simply making was, is that we don’t want barbed wire running through Jerusalem, similar to the way it was prior to the ‘67 war, that it is possible for us to create a Jerusalem that is cohesive and coherent,” Obama said.
Obama’s campaign has issued similar clarifications since the candidate’s speech to pro-Israel lobby group after he clinched the Democratic presidential nomination early last month.
In the speech, Obama told the American Israel Public Affairs Committee that if elected president in November, he would work for peace with a Palestinian state alongside Israel. “Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided,” the Illinois senator said. Palestinian leaders reacted with anger and dismay. [And so, under the bus with you, Jerusalem! – ed.]
The bottom line here is that Barack Obama tried to pander to AIPAC with one of the most important issues for Israel, telling them exactly what they wanted to hear. Then he basked in the applause.
And now he’s weaseling out of it.
Barack Obama Voted Four Times To Allow Criminal Charges Against Homeowners Who Defend Their Person and Home With a Gun
Posted by: Erick Erickson
Monday, July 14, 2008 at 08:56AM
0 Comments
In a victory for individuals across the nation, whether they know it or not, the Supreme Court has decided the 2nd amendment does do what it says -- give the people the right to keep and bear arms. Barack Obama's rapid reversal from opposition to agreement on the issue would make mere mortals snap in half under all the G-forces.
Despite Obama's propensity to say and do anything to get elected, just like with Kennedy v. Louisiana, Obama's record does not match his rhetoric.
In fact, Barack Obama specifically voted four times in the Illinois Legislature to allow criminal charges against a homeowner who used a firearm in self-defense of their person and home -- specifically what the Supreme Court says is a constitutional right. Obama may say he supports it, but his record says exactly the opposite.
In 2004, the Illinois Senate considered S.B. 2165 (IL 2004), sponsored by Senator Ed Petka (R-Plainfield). The bill came about because of an arrest in Wilmette, IL in late December of 2003. A 54-year-old businessman shot and wounded a man who had broken into his home for the second time in 24 hours. Cook County prosecutors found the shooting justified, but the businessman, Mr. DeMar, faced a fine and possible destruction of two guns under a 1989 village ordinance prohibiting handgun possession.
S.B. 2165 would allow residents to use self-defense as a basis for seeking dismissal of criminal charges stemming from local gun ordinances if they used the banned weapon in an act of self-defense in their home, business or property.
Obama voted no on third reading March 25, 2004, and voted no on concurrence to a House amendment on May 25, 2004. In fact, Obama voted no four times: in the Judiciary Committee, on Third Reading, in the Judiciary Committee's vote on concurrence with the House, and on the final concurrence.
Luckily for the people of Illinois, the legislation passed despite Obama's opposition. Had he had his way, people in Illinois could still be prosecuted for defending themselves against crimes.
But that's not the only time Obama has voted against the people's right to keep and bear arms.
In 1999, Obama voted in favor of S.B. 177 (IL 1999). The legislation required guns to be secured by trigger locks, placed in a lock box, or placed in a location that a reasonable person would believe to be secure from a minor. Likewise, in 2003, Obama voted for H.B. 2579 (IL 2003) for a law that restricted the rights of Illinois's citizens so that they could only buy one gun a month. The law created the offense of "unlawful acquisition of handguns."
In 2001, Obama voted against S.B. 604 (IL 2001), which would have allowed individuals who have valid orders of protection against other individuals to carry concealed weapons for their protection. The bill would have created an affirmative defense against a charge of violating Illinois's concealed carry law if the person had a lawfully issued protection order against someone seeking to do harm to the person.
In 2002, Obama voted against S.B. 397 (IL 2002), which amended the Firearms Owners Indentification Card Act. The legislation was specifically crafted for sporting events and allowed a non-resident participating in a sanctioned competitive shooting event in Illinois to purchase a shotgun or shotgun ammunition in Illinois, but only at the site where the event is being held, for the purpose of participating in the event.
Obama's toughlove is off key.
By Mickey Kaus
Updated Monday, July 14, 2008, at 4:44 AM ET
A reader emails:
People seem to think it's somehow a stroke of political genius that Sen. Obama is taking Sen. Hagel with him on his trip to Iraq. But why doesn't this highlight Obama's lack of judgment on the surge, by bringing along the man who considered it a catastrophically bad idea?
Actually, Hagel called the surge "the most dangerous foreign policy blunder in this country since Vietnam." ... Is Obama cannily trying to demonstrate why Hagel would be a horrifying VP pick? Is he trying to deflect attention from his own poor surge judgment ("the surge has not worked") by bringing along as a lightning rod someone whose judgment was even worse than his? ... Imagine how embarrassing it would be if Obama went with an antiwar Republican like Gen. Zinni, who supported the surge, with what now looks like contrarian wisdom. ... 1:40 A.M.
Caught Between Iraq and a Hard Base
Obama's position has been overtaken by events.
by Noemie Emery
Back in the heady days of late 2006--when Barack Obama decided on his run for president--Democrats had a foolproof plan to gain power: Use the "disastrous" war in Iraq to split the Republican base off from the center, force Republicans in Congress to desert the president, defund the war effort, and compel withdrawal. Declaring defeat in advance, and even embracing it, they tried to cripple the surge before it started. Nancy Pelosi in the House and Harry Reid in the Senate led a chorus of Democrats who declared the war lost.
Even after the surge began, they hoped that pressure would cause mass defections among Republicans, and pressure was duly poured on. Reid is "lashing out at top commanders while putting the finishing touches on a plan to force a series of votes on Iraq designed exclusively to make Republicans up for reelection in 2008 go on record in favor of continuing an unpopular war," Politico reported on June 14, 2007. "By September," Reid hoped, "Republican senators will break with the president."
The left planned an "Iraq Summer," with antiwar groups spending millions on grassroots campaigns. In May 2007, the Washington Post reported on plans to spend up to $12 million on demonstrations, phone calls, and ad campaigns to pressure Republican lawmakers. Tom Matzzie, head of the activist pressure group Americans Against Escalation in Iraq, visited the offices of Politico to unveil his grandiose plans. "Democrats and the antiwar movement had the GOP 'by the balls,' Matzzie argued. . . . 'We're going to smash
their heads against their base, and flush them down the toilet,' " he said. Late in July, Congress adjourned, with Democrats convinced that when they returned in September, Republican lines would be shattered. But the only sound one heard last fall was that of a toilet not flushing.
What happened to change things? The proverbial facts on the ground. At the end of July, longtime Bush critics Kenneth Pollack and Michael O'Hanlon, Democrats allied with a center-left think tank, returned from Iraq having found not chaos but "a war we just might win," as the headline on their New York Times op-ed proclaimed. Within weeks, three Democrats who had been to Iraq over the recess also jumped off the antiwar caravan, citing progress sufficient to make them more "flexible" when it came to demands for rapid defunding. These were not the defections Harry Reid had planned on.
Though Democrats did their best in advance to discredit the testimony to Congress in early September of Ambassador Ryan Crocker and General David Petraeus (whom they had called to testify months earlier, when they were certain there would be nothing to report but more failure), their measured accounts of modest but marked improvements everywhere in the country checked the course of debate, and then started to change its direction. Public opinion, which had aligned with the Democrats' base at the height of the violence, began to drift back towards the center. A slight uptick in the polls stiffened the spines of beleagured Republicans. The lines held, the rebellion was stymied, and Bush got his way on his war funding measures. "Iraq Summer" turned into the summer that things began to turn around in Iraq.
And so it is that this summer the Democrats and their nominee find themselves caught between an undeniable change in conditions and a dogmatic, intransigent base--in other words, in the very same spot the antiwar left had hoped to put Republicans in. "The politics of Iraq are going to change dramatically in the general election, assuming Iraq continues to show some hopefulness," O'Hanlon told the New York Times last November. "If Iraq looks at least partly salvageable, it will be important to explain as a candidate how you would salvage it. . . . The Democrats need to be very careful with what they say, and not hem themselves in."
Boxing their candidate in is, of course, what the Democratic base wants and insists on. So far, the line has been that the surge is a success but the war is a failure--"whipped cream on a pile of fertilizer," as Time's Joe Klein puts it, "a regional policy unprecedented in its stupidity and squalor." But even this hasn't quite caught up with events. Saddam is gone, Al Qaeda in Iraq is on the run, the Sunnis are with us, the Shia are turning against their militias, and the Washington Post is suggesting that "Iraq, a country with the world's second largest oil reserves and a strategic linchpin of the Middle East, just might emerge from the last five years of war and turmoil as an American ally, even if its relations with Iran remain warm." In other words, the operation was a failure, but the
patient has survived, and is somehow becoming healthier by the day. Seldom has failure appeared quite so good.
"What do the Democrats do if--yes, if, if, if--the surge appears to have succeeded?" Michael Crowley wrote in a New Republic blog last November. "If Iraq somehow stabilizes and even incrementally improves, doesn't that affect the presidential campaign?" Crowley wondered "whether the Democrats have been preparing for that possibility--and what their contingency plans are if the Iraq debate tacks substantially back the GOP's way."
In their innocent way they hadn't prepared in the slightest, which is why they are caught between a public that would rather not lose a war and a base of Bush-hating, antiwar supporters to whom the idea of giving up on losing would feel like the worst loss of all. On the one hand, the former is most of the country; on the other, for the past five years or so all of the zest, oomph, zeal, pizzazz, and certainly most of the cash in the party has come from the latter. The problem was summed up nicely last week in the Washington Post, where on Tuesday the more centrist editorial board praised Obama for moving away from the "strident and rigid posture he struck [on Iraq] during the primary campaign," while on Monday the liberal columnist E. J. Dionne had warned Obama he had to stay as strident and rigid as ever, or else he would lose the "high ground" and "dull the enthusiasm (and inhibit the campaign contributions) of the war's staunchest foes." Meanwhile, the netroots are bitching, and Obama's online donations have begun to drop off.
Throughout 2007 and into this year, the Democrats portrayed the surge as Bush's attempt to kick defeat down the road to his successor, but that line, too, has been overtaken by events. Vietnam was seen as lost when Lyndon Johnson handed it off in 1969 to Richard M. Nixon, and Nixon was not blamed for the -failure. But Iraq now, by almost every metric, is on the way up. Bush's successor will have to work hard to lose it, and do so against the loud public protests of the troops who have done so much to win it. This is where Obama's prior pronouncements would lead him, and surely he knows it. His base may still want him to lose "Bush's War," but the rest of the country would never forgive him. Or it.
Noemie Emery is a contributing editor to THE WEEKLY STANDARD.
Iraq and the Surrounding Region, As Obama Wanted It
By Patrick J. Casey
It's worthwhile for us to imagine what Iraq would look like today had Barack Obama been in control way back in 2007, particularly as Iran launches missiles over the Persian Gulf and continues its unabated quest for nuclear weapons. How would we be positioned to deal with the Iranian Threat? (At the moment, Obama's only response is to blame the Bush Administration and call for stronger diplomacy.
During 2007, Obama had very specific suggestions on what we should do militarily in Iraq. Had we gone along with them, as most Democrats other than Joe Lieberman wanted to, and taking into account the trends that were present in Iraq during 2006 and pre-surge 2007, what would that region look like now?
On April 10th 2007, Barack Obama participated in a Town Hall forum for Presidential candidates sponsored by Moveon.org. This was three months after President Bush announced his plan for the surge in Iraq, but before it had been fully implemented. Obama promised the audience that if he were to have his way, he would begin unconditional troop withdrawals on May 1st, 2007, and that the last troops would leave Iraq by March 31, 2008.
Obama indicated that there was no military solution in Iraq, and had himself introduced legislation in January 2007 to force his timetable on the troops. That legislation, The Iraq War De-escalation Act of 2007, would have also prevented the surge troops from being deployed.
The Bugging Out Scenario
Luckily, the world will never experience what the region would look like had Barack Obama had his way. But at the very least, it is safe to say violence would have continued to increase rather than decrease (as it had been trending), and 15 of the 18 political benchmarks would certainly not have been reached.
So let's look at the scenario of Obama's unconditional "bugging out" of US troops from Iraq in a bit more detail than just an assumption that things would have gone, generally, to hell. The violence within Iraq that erupted in 2006, especially after the al-Askari Mosque bombing, seemed to portend the eventual breakup of Iraq, had the surge not taken place. At that time, it was difficult to argue against the viewpoint that we were watching the disintegration of the country of Iraq before our eyes, and doing nothing proactive to stop it.
Breakaway Regions
Had Obama had his way, there's a good chance that Iran would have fully taken over the Shia region in southern Iraq both directly and via its proxy Muqtada al-Sadr, separating it from the rest of Iraq and fulfilling its desire for a larger Shia Islamic State. That would have meant that Iran would have not only controlled its own oil, but also a significant part of Iraqi oil as well. The Mullahs and Ahmadinejad might well be running Basra, the oil platforms in the Persian Gulf, the al Faw peninsula and the port of Umm Qsar -- making it uncomfortably easy for Iran to shut off the flow of Middle East oil and shipping to the rest of the world.
In the north, there would be a separate war going on, potentially involving several different countries -- a conflict much worse that the current occasional border skirmish between the Kurds and Turks. As Northern Iraq could have broken off from Baghdad in the face of other disintegration, there's a good chance that Turkey would either be contemplating or have already commenced a full scale invasion of the breakway Kurdish region -- since the expressed goal of many of the Northern Iraqi Kurds is to eventually unite all of historical Kurdistan in one large independent country, something Turkey has vowed to prevent militarily. Since the territory of Kurdistan includes not only land currently located in Iraq and Turkey, but also territory in Iran and Syria, the situation wouldn't have been pretty.
That would leave the traditional Sunni territory surrounding Baghdad alone, and with little or no natural resources. The capital city itself would probably look a lot like Beirut right now, with Al Qaeda in control, and would remain under terrorist control for the foreseeable future.
As all of this would have been taking place, one or two brigades of combat troops a month would have been leaving Iraq under orders from Obama, putting increased pressure on the remaining US troops. Both Al Qaeda and Iran would be justifiably claiming victory over America, handing them the greatest recruitment tool for terrorist groups ever seen. Terrorist attacks against our troops in Iraq and elsewhere with the resultant loss of life and injuries would be increasing, rather than decreasing.
Pressure to Return
What would be the rest of the world's reaction? It's safe to say that there would be mounting international pressure on the United States to stop its retreat and go back into Iraq forcefully -- essentially to fix what had been broken. If Obama decided to do so (remember, he said that there was no military solution), it would then require fighting a larger regional war in Iraq on three major fronts:
1) in the north against the forces and influences of Turkey, Iran, and Syria;
2) in the south against al-Sadr and Iran; and
3) in central Iraq on the streets of Baghdad against Al Qaeda.
Such military action would have required many times more than the number of surge troops that President Bush ordered into Iraq (and Obama tried to stop) in January of 2007.
It's also important to note that the primary reason why Iraq was spiraling out of control in 2006 was not because of military action, but because of the lack of it. The United States had stopped aggressively prosecuting the war, instead choosing to use diplomacy as its main instrument in addressing the deteriorating situation within the country. In essence, we had stopped fighting the war offensively prior to the enemy being vanquished and real security established. Call it the State Department method of conducting warfare. That was the strategy that needed to be changed, and President Bush did so by replacing the failed commanders in the region and launching the surge. Barack Obama, on the other hand, while publicly requesting "a change in tactics", offered only a plan (S.433) of retreat and surrender.
Today, we must look back at the clearly stated actions (retreat, no surge) that Obama wanted to take in 2007, and compare them to the results that we can see today of the change in strategy ordered by President Bush that the presumed Democratic Presidential nominee so forcefully opposed at that time.
With that in mind, why should we trust anything that Obama now says about diplomacy or military action in the region that includes Iraq and Iran? If there is even a second of hesitation in answering that question, then Barack Obama should not be elected President and Commander-in-Chief of our armed forces, especially during a time of war.
Our enemies are licking their chops....
Was Schumer's Attack On Indymac Coordinated with 'activist' group?
Clarice Feldman
CNBC is suggesting that Senator Schumer's unprecedented role in breaking Indymac, a Pasadena bank, was part of a coordinated scheme with The Center for Responsible Lending , as usual, a name from a far left "public interest" operation which, as is often the case, disguises its objectives and operations. It is for anything but responsible klending practices, in my opinion. (See this.)
"The Center for Responsible Lending issued an attack on Indymac within a few days of Schumerʼs letter. CRL is part of a small army of left of center ʽresearchʼ groups, community organizers, and public interest law firms who make their living accusing home lenders of racial redlining and predatory lending. On June 20th the Center accused Indymac of unfair practices regarding minority borrowers.
"A suspicious person might think that a network of lefty attack groups proficient in bank bashing and frequently funded by trial lawyers and short-sellers, coordinated their activities with a law firm on the hunt and a Senator who works closely with the network. "
Just imagine how much damage Schumer and his party will do should they control all three branches of the federal government.
Great picture!!
The resistible rise of Barack Obama
Jonah Goldberg devotes a good column to the thesis that Barack Obama believes in nothing more than he believes in himself. He collects quotes that illustrate Obama's adolescent grandiosity, a grandiosity that was visibly on display in his handling of his treatment of Jeremiah Wright.
In a long New Yorker article Ryan Lizza documents the rise of Barack Obama in Chicago from community organizer to United States Senator. Lizza's article coincidentally demonstrates that Obama's grandiosity is a phenomenon that can be traced through his years in Chicago. The entire article is worth reading. Below I've taken the liberty of highlighting excerpts that illuminate Obama's character and self-understanding during these years:
Ivory Mitchell, the ward chairman in Obama’s neighborhood, says of Obama that “he was typical of what most aspiring politicians are: self-centered—that ‘I can do anything and I’m willing to do it overnight.’”
***
Many people who knew Obama then remember him for his cockiness.
***
[When Obama secured the endorsement of state senator Alice Palmer to succeed her while she unsuccessfully sought the Democratic endorsement for a congressional seat and then refused to step aside to let her reclaim her position. Palmer filed a petition for a place on the ballot.] Obama was conciliatory about the awkward political situation, telling the Hyde Park Herald that he understood that some people were upset about the “conflict between old loyalties and new enthusiasms.” Privately, however, he unleashed his operators. With the help of the Dobrys, he was able to remove not just Palmer’s name from the ballot but the name of every other opponent as well. “He ran unopposed, which is a good way to win,” [former D.C. Circuit Judge Abner] Mikva said, laughing at the recollection.
***
[Obama confronts welfare reform in the state senate.] In an interview with the Cleveland Plain Dealer, published a few days after Clinton said that he would sign the welfare-reform bill, Obama talked about the Presidential campaign, saying that Bob Dole “seems to me to be a classic example of somebody who had no reason to run. You’re seventy-three years old, you’re already the third-most-powerful man in the country. So why? . . . And Bill Clinton? Well, his campaign’s fascinating to a student of politics. It’s disturbing to someone who cares about certain issues. But politically it seems to be working.”
Soon, Obama began writing a regular column—“Springfield Report”—for the Hyde Park Herald. In the first one, on February 19, 1997, he wrote, “Last year, President Clinton signed a bill that, for the first time in 60 years, eliminates the federal guarantee of support for poor families and their children.” The column was earnest and wonky. It betrayed no hint of liberal piety about the new law, but emphasized that there weren’t enough entry-level jobs in Chicago to absorb all the welfare recipients who would soon be leaving the system,
The new welfare law was one of the first issues that Obama faced as a legislator. “I am not a defender of the status quo with respect to welfare,” he said, choosing his words with care during debate on the Illinois Senate floor. “Having said that, I probably would not have supported the federal legislation, because I think it had some problems. But I’m a strong believer in making lemonade out of lemons.” Perhaps the law’s most punitive aspect was that it cut off aid to poor legal immigrants, a provision that Clinton, in his 2004 memoir, called “particularly harsh” and “unjustifiable.” The law that Obama helped pass in Illinois restored benefits to this group. (In a continuing effort to produce lemonade, Obama’s first ad of the 2008 general-election campaign says that he “passed laws moving people from welfare to work.”)
***
[Tony] Rezko was one of the people Obama consulted when he considered running to replace Palmer, and Rezko eventually raised about ten per cent of Obama’s funds for that first campaign. As a state senator, Obama became an advocate of the tax-credit program. “That’s an example of a smart policy,” he told the Chicago Daily Law Bulletin in 1997. “The developers were thinking in market terms and operating under the rules of the marketplace; but at the same time, we had government supporting and subsidizing those efforts.” Obama and Rezko’s friendship grew stronger. They dined together regularly and even, on at least one occasion, retreated to Rezko’s vacation home, in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.
***
In another episode that has Obama’s old friends feeling frustrated, Obama recently blamed his first campaign manager, Carol Anne Harwell, for reporting on a 1996 questionnaire that Obama favored a ban on handguns. According to her friends, Harwell was furious that the campaign made her Obama’s scapegoat. “She got, as the saying goes, run over by a bus,” Lois Friedberg-Dobry said.
***
Obama’s subtle understanding of the way the city’s politics had changed—with fund-raising replacing organization as the key to victory—surely encouraged him in his next campaign. Almost as soon as he got to Springfield, he was planning another move. He was bored there—once, he appeared to doze off during a caucus meeting—and frustrated by the Republicans’ total control over the legislature. He seemed to believe, according to colleagues at the time, that he was destined for better things than being trapped in one of America’s more notoriously corrupt state capitals.
***
Obama made a serious misstep when, visiting his grandmother in Hawaii, he missed a crucial vote on gun-control legislation in Springfield. Even worse, on the day of the vote a column by Obama about how the gun bill was “sorely needed” appeared in the Hyde Park Herald, under the headline “IDEOLOGUES FRUSTRATE GUN LAW.”
***
[Obama helped design a new senate district running from the South Side to the North.] The new district was a natural fit for the candidate that Obama was in the process of becoming. “He saw that when we were doing fund-raisers in the Rush campaign his appeal to, quite frankly, young white professionals was dramatic.”
***
In the end, Obama’s North Side fund-raising base and his South Side political base were united in one district. He now represented Hyde Park operators like Lois Friedberg-Dobry as well as Gold Coast doyennes like Bettylu Saltzman, and his old South Side street operative Al Kindle as well as his future consultant David Axelrod. In an article in the Hyde Park Herald about how “partisan” and “undemocratic” Illinois redistricting had become, Obama was asked for his views. As usual, he was candid. “There is a conflict of interest built into the process,” he said. “Incumbents drawing their own maps will inevitably try to advantage themselves.”
***
[Lizza reports that Obama sought to recruit University of Chicago "Israel Lobby" Professor John Mearsheim to the antiwar rally in downtown Chicago at which Obama was to speak. Mearsheimer was otherwise engaged. Obama spoke at the rally.] “Let me begin by saying that although this has been billed as an antiwar rally, I stand before you as someone who is not opposed to war in all circumstances,” he told the crowd. He then went further, defending justifiable wars in almost glorious terms. “The Civil War was one of the bloodiest in history, and yet it was only through the crucible of the sword, the sacrifice of multitudes, that we could begin to perfect this union, and drive the scourge of slavery from our soil. I don’t oppose all wars. My grandfather signed up for a war the day after Pearl Harbor was bombed, fought in Patton’s Army. He saw the dead and dying across the fields of Europe; he heard the stories of fellow-troops who first entered Auschwitz and Treblinka. He fought in the name of a larger freedom, part of that arsenal of democracy that triumphed over evil, and he did not fight in vain. I don’t oppose all wars.” It took some nerve to tweak the crowd in this way. After all, it was unlikely that many of the protesters knew who Obama was, and in a lengthy write-up of the event in the Chicago Tribune the following day he was not mentioned. Yet the speech reads as if it had been written for a much bigger audience.
***
[Marty Nesbitt is one of Obama's closest friends. Nesbitt discusses Obama's thinking about a possible 2004 Senate camaign.] "[H]e just laid out an economic analysis. It becomes about money, because he knew that if people knew his story they would view him as a better candidate than anybody else he thought might be in the field. And so he said, ‘Therefore, if you raise five million dollars, I have a fifty-per-cent chance of winning. If you raise seven million dollars, I have a seventy-per-cent chance of winning. If you raise ten million dollars, I guarantee victory.”
***
Obama has frequently been one step ahead of his friends and the public in anticipating his own rise. Perhaps it is all those people he has met over the years who told him that he would be President one day. The Reverend Alvin Love, a South Side Baptist minister and a longtime Obama friend, said that Obama called him in December, 2006, seeking advice about whether to run for President. “My dad told me that you’ve got to strike while the iron is hot,” Love recalls saying, and Obama replied, “The iron can’t get any hotter.”
Obama has always had a healthy understanding of the reaction he elicits in others, and he learned to use it to his advantage a very long time ago. Marty Nesbitt remembers Obama’s utter calm the day he gave his celebrated speech at the 2004 Democratic National Convention, in Boston, which made him an international celebrity and a potential 2008 Presidential candidate. “We were walking down the street late in the afternoon,” Nesbitt told me. “And this crowd was building behind us, like it was Tiger Woods at the Masters.”
“Barack, man, you’re like a rock star,” Nesbitt said.
“Yeah, if you think it’s bad today, wait until tomorrow,” Obama replied.
“What do you mean?”
“My speech,” Obama said, “is pretty good.”
In this very long article, Obama's assessment of Bob Dole is one item that sticks out. As Senate Majority Leader, Dole was already one of the most powerful men in the country when he chose to run for president against Bill Clinton. By Obama's reckoning, Dole's age and eminence told against him. For Obama, on the other hand, seeking the presidency is a career move that fulfills the destiny foretold by his election to the presidency of the Harvard Law Review.
I generally hesitate to make predictions, but here is one that's a good bet. We'll be hearing some version of the quoted portion of Obama's 2002 antiwar speech on August 28 when Obama addresses the multitudes in his sermon on the mount at Invesco Field.
Posted by Scott at 7:03 AM | Permalink | E-mail this post to a friend |
July 12, 2008
Don't follow the bouncing poll, Part Two
A Newsweek poll showing Obama leading McCain by 3 percentage points is generating some buzz. That's because the previous Newsweek poll had Obama up by 15 points.
As we contended at the time, however, the spread reflected in that earlier Newsweek poll lacked credibility. Thus, the disappearance of that spread should not be considered significant.
The two polls I watch most closely -- the Gallup and Rasmussen tracking polls -- continue to show a tight race that isn't changing much. Throughout July, Gallup has had Obama at around 47 percent and McCain at around 43. That's just about what the same tracking poll generally showed last month, though McCain pulled even briefly.
Rasmussen shows a little bit of movement in McCain's favor. When "leaners" are included, Obama is holding steady at 47-48 percent, but McCain has edged up from about 44 percent to 47 percent over the past week.
The 3 point Obama lead in the latest Newsweek poll is well in line with Gallup and Rasmussen, and accurately reflects, I think, where the race stands, where it has been recently, and where it's likely to stay for a while.
Posted by Paul at 9:08 PM | Permalink | E-mail this post to a friend |
Obama in the land of Joseph Heller
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If I were Obama’s handlers - not to mention the candidate himself - I’d be mighty worried about the latest round of polls showing the Illinois senator in a dead heat with McCain. This although the Arizona senator hasn’t made much of splash in the media lately. Almost all the coverage has been about Obama.
I had always assumed that the race would tighten up in October, but we’re a long way from then. Why so early? What does this mean? Well, I might go on about this at more length, but it’s obvious Barack’s deep in the old Catch-22, not able to look like the candidate of change or “new” politics as he slips-slides to the center. And to make matters worse, he can’t even go that far to the middle without sounding like a total hypocrite and alienating his base. He’s not even able to advocate something as apparent to the American public as the necessity of off-shore oil drilling, when the Chinese and the Cubans are about to drill in those same waters off America’s shores. (Ironically, Obama may end up having considerably more trouble with his base than McCain will with his.) And there’s the nuclear power question, and Iraq and Iran. Common sense puts Obama on virtuallythe wrong side of everything with nowhere to go but the center and a hoard of ideologues from the Daily Kos and Moveon, chomping at his heels. Am I crazy to think this election may not end up being so close?
You're asking the wrong one
Try easymoney 101
Others have posted repeatedly on secret troop movement in certain towns signalling imminent martial law
" The sky is falling, the sky is falling "
Been reading similar posts on this thread for years now.......
Can We Just All Be Human One Saturday Morning? [Kathryn Jean Lopez]
AP memorializes Tony Snow thus:
With a quick-from-the-lip repartee, broadcaster's good looks and a relentlessly bright outlook — if not always a command of the facts — he became a popular figure around the country to the delight of his White House bosses.
Now, correct me if I'm wrong, but part of why Tony was such a force was because he really shook up the press office in terms of getting facts to the American people. Americans didn't know about successes on the ground in Iraq and they ought to, was Snow's attitude. At the time, it seemed new thinking.
So the AP gets points this morning in the nasty, unnecessary, and off categories.
The New York Times, Inappropriate And Inaccurate
In its obituary for Tony Snow, the New York Times takes this mild shot at a man who just died:
At the White House, he turned the daily press briefing into something of a one-man show, challenging reporters’ questions and delivering hard-hitting answers, even when he was occasionally short on the facts.
Just four paragraphs later, they include this paragraph (since corrected):
During Mr. Bush’s 2006 re-election campaign, Mr. Snow raised eyebrows by using his celebrity to raise money for Republican candidates — something that by Mr. Snow’s own admission, other press secretaries had declined to do for fear of seeming too partisan.
Um, the President was re-elected in 2004. Who, exactly, is "short on the facts"? This from a newspaper that has 12 corrections this morning.
One Way To Get Serious About Saving Our Economy: Shale Oil
In the post immediately below, Senator John Cornyn talks about the need to get serious about solving our energy problems by developing our own domestic resources. One good example is shale oil, of which the U.S. has more than any other country. In fact, Rocky Mountain shale is believed to contain the equivalent of 2 trillion barrels of oil. Is that a lot? The entire world has used around 1 trillion barrels since oil was discovered in Pennsylvania in 1859.
This chart by the Institute for Energy Research shows graphically how America's shale oil reserves compare to other countries' petroleum reserves. Click to enlarge:
Can shale oil be developed economically? At today's prices, of course. A few years ago it was estimated that shale oil development would be competitive at around $40 a barrel. That figure may have risen a bit, but with world oil prices over $140 a barrel, shale oil development is a no-brainer.
Republicans in Congress like Utah's Orrin Hatch have been pushing for shale oil development for years. But, like drilling in the outer continental shelf and in ANWR, shale oil development is being blocked by Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid and the Democrats in Congress. The future of America's economy is at risk as a result.
Posted by John at 8:20 AM | Permalink | E-mail this post to a friend |
John Cornyn: Time to get serious about energy
John Cornyn represents Texas in the United States Senate. Senator Cornyn has forwarded a post commenting on John Hinderaker's "Democrats sucking wind on energy policy." Senator Cornyn writes:
After reading John Hinderaker’s post on Friday about lack of Democratic leadership on energy, I can report that the view looks about the same from my Senate office. Nancy Pelosi promised an effective new energy plan before the 2006 election – that’s about 809 days ago – and we’re still waiting. They’re now postponing votes because some Democrats fear reality has finally set in – and Congress may actually approve more domestic exploration for new energy.
We’ve put ourselves in an irrational box. We’ve put 85 percent of our prime energy exploration lands off-limits. The U.S. is the only country in the world that refuses to develop its own natural resources. With a growing worldwide demand for energy, we’re willing to enrich foreign governments – some of which wish us harm – instead of helping ourselves.
The U.S. is well on the way toward transitioning away from over-reliance on fossil fuels. I’m for pursuing every source of energy out there – solar, nuclear, clean coal, wind, biofuels, hydrogen, shale. We need it all. But we’ve built up an infrastructure over 100 years that must be relied upon as we make the change to renewable sources. Congress has to get out of the way and allow the U.S. to develop its resources for that infrastructure – or we’re headed towards economic catastrophe.
As John notes, a number of Democratic officeholders have heard from their constituents, and they want to vote to expand energy exploration. But their leadership is making sure they cannot. You can feel the Democratic solidarity on this fragmenting. One of two scenarios is likely. Either the leadership wakes up and allows expanded development – in Alaska, outer continental shelf, shale – or I suspect Republicans are going to do a great deal better in this fall’s elections than most pundits now assume.
I’m staging an "Energy Independence Days" discussion this week on my Web site. I will be joined by Alaska Gov. Sarah Palin, former Speaker Newt Gingrich and others who see clearly the need to produce more domestic energy and reduce our reliance on foreign sources. You know I am a long time and enthusiastic Power Line fan, and it’s an honor to communicate with your readers. I hope many of you will join me at JohnCornyn.com this coming week, and share your thoughts on our energy problem.
Thanks to Senator Cornyn for the kind words and for his report. We look foward to checking out the discussion Senator Cornyn will be hosting next week.
Obama Supporters Want Their Money Back
Posted by: Dan Spencer
Saturday, July 12, 2008 at 08:11AM
2 Comments
Obama is facing a mutiny over his shift right toward the center. The Democrats' nominee to be, has offended his extremist left wing base with his "shift," some would say flip flop, on the terrorism surveillance bill:
Thousands are using MyBarackObma.com to angrily organize against him because of a changed position on terrorist wiretap legislation that awaits Senate action as early as Wednesday.
[. . .]
The controversy centers on modifications to the Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act and the government's quest to monitor suspected terrorists that civil libertarians worry could infringe on the privacy rights of others. Obama had pledged earlier this year to oppose—even filibuster—legislation that would immunize telecommunications companies against lawsuits that challenge cooperation with federal authorities in warrantless wiretapping.
After Obama shifted, or flip flopped, and decided to vote for the terrorism surveillance bill a new online group named "Senator Obama—Please Vote NO on Telecom Immunity—Get FISA Right" formed on his campaign's social networking Website.
Now with more than 22,000 members, it is the largest group on MyBarackObama.com:
The online group is flooded with messages of disappointment and disillusionment. Some threaten to ask that their campaign contributions be returned, while others suggest they will simply stay home this fall.
One man even said he had removed his Obama bumper sticker from his car. "It's the first and only bumper sticker that I've ever put on a vehicle that I owned, so my disappointment felt personal and significant," he wrote.
Watch the following video:
Live by the internet, die by the internet.
At Reuters, Daniel Trotta writes that by opening his campaign to so many surrogates on the internet, Obama is in danger losing control of his message:
The Internet also has provided a forum for whisper campaigns such as one promoting the false assertion he is Muslim. White supremacist groups, too, have intensified their online rhetoric coinciding with the political ascent of a man who if elected in November would be America's first black president. Obama, an Illinois senator, will face Republican Sen. John McCain in the general election.
"A basic fundamental of any campaign is to control the message. And when you open yourself up this much via the Internet, you cannot control your message because the Internet can take a life of its own," said Ravi Singh, CEO of ElectionMall Technologies, a technology consultant to political campaigns.
Some of Obama's own liberal supporters have used the my.barackobama.com Web site to criticize him as moving to the political center, particularly for his changed position on legislation overhauling U.S. spy laws.
After running a primary campaign from the far left, Obama's record again impedes his shift right toward the center.
In October, the Obama campaign pledged Obama would filibuster "any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies:"
Obama Spokesman Bill Burton: "To be clear: Barack will support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies." (Greg Sargent, "Obama Camp Says It: He'll Support Filibuster Of Any Bill Containing Telecom Immunity," Talking Points Memo's "Election Central" Blog, tpmelectioncentral.talkingpointsmemo.com, 10/24/07.)
In December, Obama's office said Obama "unequivocally opposes giving retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies:"
"Senator Obama unequivocally opposes giving retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies and has cosponsored Senator's efforts to remove that provision from the FISA bill. ... Senator Obama supports a filibuster of this bill, and strongly urges others to do the same." (Sen. Barack Obama, "Statement From Senator Obama's Office On The FISA Bill," Press Release, 12/17/07.)
In February, Obama voted against FISA legislation that contained retroactive immunity:
"Motion to invoke cloture (thus limiting debate) on the bill that would amend the 1978 Foreign Intelligence Surveillance Act (FISA) to authorize warrantless surveillance of foreign targets, even if they are communicating with someone in the United States. It would give the FISA court authority to approve several aspects of how such surveillance is conducted. It also would grant retroactive legal immunity to telecommunications companies alleged to have participated in the National Security Agency's warrantless surveillance program." (Sen. Barack Obama, Statement From Senator Obama's Office On The FISA Bill, Press Release, 2/12/08.)
Obama's FISA shift was noted in the media as "politically expedient:"
"His support for a government surveillance bill that offers retroactive immunity to telecommunications companies -- a bill that he vowed last year to filibuster -- angered liberal Internet activists who felt betrayed by what they saw as a politically expedient move designed to inoculate himself against GOP charges that he's weak on national security." (Kenneth P. Vogel , "Obama: Change Agent Goes Conventional," The Politico, 6/27/08.)
"'To be clear: Barack will support a filibuster of any bill that includes retroactive immunity for telecommunications companies.'-- Obama spokesman Bill Burton, Oct. 24, 2007. That was then: Democratic primaries to be won, netroot lefties to be seduced. With all that (and Hillary Clinton) out of the way, Obama now says he'll vote in favor of the new FISA bill that gives the telecom companies blanket immunity for post-Sept. 11 eavesdropping." (Charles Krauthammer, Op-Ed, "The Ever-Malleable Mr. Obama," The Washington Post, 6/27/08.)
"Senator Barack Obama Vowed In January (When He Was Still Fighting For The Democratic Nomination) That He Would Filibuster Against Immunity. Now He Says He Will Vote For An 'Imperfect' Bill And Fix It If He Wins. Sound Familiar?" (Editorial, "Compromising The Constitution," The New York Times, 7/8/08)
Obama denies he is shifting right and claims those that say he is aren't listening:
“Look, let me talk about the broader issue, this whole notion that I am shifting to the center,” he told a crowd gathered at a town hall-style meeting in this Atlanta suburb. “The people who say this apparently haven’t been listening to me.”
Obama is wrong, as the online mutiny demonstrates, people are listening carefully. More carefully than Obama's sudden lurch to the right can withstand.
Senator Schumer (D-NY) Kills a Bank
Reportedly the most dangerous place in Washington, DC is attempting to get between Senator Charles Schumer, the senior senator from New York, and a TV camera.
Today federal regulators directly blamed Sen. Schumer for causing the third largest bank failure in history, a disaster that is likely to cost American taxpayers as much as $8 billion.
Senator Schumer ten days ago wrote a letter to federal regulators that specifically named IndyMac, a $32 billion bank, as failing. Senator Schumer made the letter public, which caused a depsitor run on the bank.
According to John Reich, the Director of the Office of Thift Supervision, Mr. Schumer's public release of the letter "spooked" the bank's customers, giving the bank "a heart attack" that resulted in its failure.
In addition to the loss to taxpayers, approximately 10,000 IndyMac customers will lose at least a portion of their deposits with the bank.
No other senator has made public such a letter. This is a first.
These are the same people who want to manage the health system. Scary.
IRAN MISSILE TEST BLUFF: OLD ROCKETS, BOGUS VIDEO
Fri Jul 11 2008 15:18:02 ET
Many of Iran's claims related to missile tests during "Great Prophet III" war games -- appear to be smoke and mirrors!
The missiles tested DID NOT not have 2,000-kilometer range, the NEW YORK TIMES is planning to report on Saturday.
Iran DID NOT launch a Shahab-3 missile, able to reach Israel.
It was an older missile that was out of production, newsroom sources tell DRUDGE.
And a video showing what appeared to be many missiles being fired -- is actually one missile, filmed from different angles!
NYT's Bill Broad is planning to quote military insiders.
Developing...
Drudge
Well, the Contract with America- if it had been carried out would have been a difference maker
It's clear now that they all are just cynically out for themselves
The bailouts just distort the natural rhythm of any market
Taking risk out of the equation just insures bigger bubbles later on
LTCM almsot took the system down and was bailed out. The cost then was thought to be astronomical.
The current write downs are many factors bigger
Just like the stock market, the whole system is rigged to protect the big money interests
I guess I must have missed the part of the Constitution where they mention foreclosure as being illegal along with falling house values
low-income home owners who were lured into high-interest mortgages by predatory mortgage companies
What a fairy tale. People were given the terms of the loan before they signed
The bailouts of the banks and homeowners in default will only serve to take risk out of the equation and thus insure future bubbles with bigger bailouts till one time the system just implodes
Space and Science Research Center
The Space and Science Research Center Issues A Formal Declaration:
Global Warming Has Ended – The Next Climate Change to A Pronounced Cold Era Has
Begun.
In a news conference held in Orlando, Florida today, Mr. John L. Casey, Director of the Space and Science Research Center, issued a landmark declaration on climate change.
“After an exhaustive review of a substantial body of climate research, and in conjunction with the obvious and compelling new evidence that exists, it is time that the world community acknowledges that the Earth has begun its next climate change. In an opinion echoed by many scientists around the world, the Space and Science Research Center (SSRC), today declares that the world’s climate warming of the past decades has now come to an end. A new climate era has already started that is bringing predominantly colder global temperatures for many years into the future. In some years this new climate will create dangerously cold weather with significant ill-effects world wide. Global warming is over – a new cold climate has begun.”
According to Mr. Casey, who spoke to print and TV media representatives today, this next cold era is coming about as a result of the reversal of the 206 year cycle of the sun which he independently discovered and announced in May of 2007.
Casey amplified the declaration by adding, “Though the SSRC first announced a prediction of the coming new climate era to the US government and media in early 2007, the formal declaration has been held off pending actual events that validate the previously forecast new cold period. We now have unmistakable signs of accelerating decline in global temperatures and growing glacial ice, coupled with the dramatic if not startling changes in the sun’s surface including unusually low and slow sunspot activity. These signs, in conjunction with the research center’s ‘relational cycle theory ” or “RC Theory” of climate change which predicted these changes, now leaves no doubt that the process has already been initiated. It is also unstoppable. Our world is rapidly cooling. Even though we still may have isolated warm temperature records, the global trend to a colder era is now irreversible.”
As to whether others agree with his declaration, Casey congratulated the many other scientists around the world who had done “many years of outstanding research” which he used to corroborate his own research after he first found these climate-driving solar cycles and formulated the RC Theory. In the news conference he listed and praised more than a dozen other scientists, most in foreign countries, who had come to the same prediction on the Earth’s climate shift to a cold era.
He said, “I have consulted with colleagues world wide who have reached a similar conclusion. They have likewise been attempting to advise their own governments and media of the impending cold era and the difficult times that the extreme cold weather may bring. They are to be commended for their bold public stances and publication of their research which of course has been in direct opposition to past conventional thought on the nature and causes of the last twenty years of global warming. These last one or two decades of increased global warming were essentially the peak heating phase of the 206 year cycle.”
In the one hour presentation, Casey detailed the solar activity cycles that have been driving the Earth’s climate for the past 1,200 years. He condemned the climate change confusion and alarmism which has accompanied seven separate periods over the past 100 years, where scientists and the media flip-flopped on reporting that the Earth was either entering a new ‘ice age’ or headed for a global meltdown where melting glacial ice would swamp the planet’s coastal cities.
Much of the presentation focused on the positive and negative effects the next climate change will have on the State of Florida, the nation and the world.
Some effects of the coming cold climate on NASA’s space program were highlighted including an extended “quiet period’ produced by reduced solar activity. Casey believes this cold climate era will be the best time since the space program began to conduct human spaceflight. Advises Casey, “With the sun going into what I call “solar hibernation,” the harmful effects of solar radiation on astronauts in space will be minimized.”
Regarding the impacts of the next cold climate period on hurricanes, Casey summarized by saying “I would not be surprised to see the lowest number and least intense storms ever recorded in the US during this cold epoch, for obvious reasons. We should not forget however, the buildup along coastlines and an ever increasing population may continue to make Florida’s hurricanes potentially more destructive in the future, regardless of the number we have.”
On the subject of cold climate effects on agriculture, Casey was not optimistic. “I can see,” he added, “just like the last time this 206 year cycle brought cold, that there will be substantial damage to the world’s agricultural systems. This time however we will have eight billion mouths to feed during the worst years around 2031 compared to previously when we had only one billion. Yet even then, many died from the combined effects of bitter cold and lack of food.”
In his concluding remarks, Casey called on all leaders to immediately move from the past global warming planning to prepare for the already started change to a cold climate.
He ended with, “Now that the new cold climate has begun to arrive, we must immediately start the preparation, the adaptation process. At least because of the RC Theory we now have some advance warning. No longer do we need to wonder what the Earth’s next climate changes will be two or three generations out. But we must nonetheless be ready to adjust with our now more predictable solar cycles that are the primary determinants of climate on Earth.”
Press Release SSRC 1-2008
WHo are they?
Headquartered in Orlando, Florida, the Space and Science Research Center (SSRC) is the leading science and engineering research company internationally, that specializes in the analysis of and planning for climate changes based upon the "Theory of Relational Cycles of Solar Activity," also called the RC Theory. (See Services).
SSRC has on its staff of consulting scientists, some of the world's best experts in the field of solar physics pertaining to the research into the matter of the coming major solar minimum.
This major minimum called a "solar hibernation" is forecast to have the potential to cause major world wide agricultural and economic effects. The SSRC also possesses the capability to conduct planning and research into such effects and how best to prepare individuals and governments at all levels for the next climate change to a period of colder weather.
John L. Casey
Director, Space and Science Research Center
Mr. Casey has accumulated over thirty years of professional experience spanning a wide variety of technologies, industries, and international endeavors, to include performing important services as a space policy advisor to the White House, and Congress. He has been a consultant to NASA Headquarters performing sspace shuttle and space station analysis. He has led teams conducting commercial spaceport design world wide, as well as performing satellite launch studies for the Department of Defense. His experience also includes being a former space shuttle engineer, military missile and computer systems officer, advanced rocketry and commercial space developer. He has an extensive executive management background in the start-up and financing of high technology companies. He has a BS degree in Physics and Mathematics and an MA degree in Management. He was also past Chairman of GFSD, an international charity that provided aid to women and children in Iraq and Afghanistan. You can contact Mr. Casey directly at mail@spaceandscience.net
His scientific paper, "The Theory of Relational Cycles of Solar Activity" also called the "RC Theory," is available at the 'RC Theory" page on this site. It also includes a significant amount of corroborating research references as well as a link to the NASA web site that discusses the current changes in the sun's surface flow that presage the coming of the next climate change according to the SSRC.
Dr. Boris Komitov.
He is one of Europe’s foremost authorities on solar cycle study and its effects of the climate of the Earth. He also has done extensive research into cometary atmospheres.
He holds a M.S in Physics from the Sofia University and a Ph.D. in Physics from the Institute of Astronomy, Bulgarian Academy of Sciences. He is now a professor at the Institute of Astronomy. Since 1996 he has concentrated in solar activity analysis focusing on large time scale variations using sunspots and other proxies of solar activity. He has published important and fundamental research papers dealing with the determination of climate change as a function of the sun’s behavior. Some of his relevant papers found at his web site:
He can be reached at:
Bulgarian Academy of Sciences
Institute of Astronomy
Bulgaria
6003 Stara Zagora-3, PO Box 39
b_komitov@sz.inetg.bg
+(359) (42) 237-352
Dr.Komitov's Web Site
A Recent Paper From Dr.Komitov
Dr. Ernest Njau.
He is a leading scientist in the field of solar variability and its relationship to the earth’s climate.
Dr. Njau holds a B.S., M.Sc and D.Sc. In Electronics and Meteorology from the University of Dar es Salaam, Tanzania. He also holds a Ph.D. in Radio Communication from LaTrobe University (Australia).
His current fields of research include the solar-weather-climate relationships, as well as climate and weather prediction, and ionospheric radio transmission variability analysis. He is the author of over 100 scientific papers in these fields as well as fifteen individual science reference books, primarily in physics education. He is an award winning scientist; selected Scholar of the Millennium at the University of Dar es Salaam in 1999.
He can be reached at:
University of Dar es Salaam
Tanzania
Email: ecnjau@yahoo.co.uk
Phone: 255-22-2410277
Mobile: 0784-388830
CV For Dr. Njau, Including List of Published Research
Rethinking the Goals of a National Mortgage Bailout
An already-ugly problem gets worse
By blackhedd Posted in Dodd-Frank Act | Economy | housing | Mortgage Bailout — Comments (18) / Email this page » / Leave a comment »
Front and center this week have been the ill fortunes of Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) that together own trillions of dollars’ worth of US home mortgages.
At this point in time, there really is no reason to own the stock of either company. The Administration is said to be looking carefully at whether and how to do a government takeover of one or both. The grand 35-plus year experiment in semi-public support for US housing may be coming to an end.
But that’s far from the only problem in the mortgage/housing sector. In fact, it may be the easy problem. The hard problem is what to do about all the homeowners that are falling behind on their payments.
This is a time bomb that continues to tick away, and Congress has been working hard to pass a huge bailout bill (the Dodd-Frank Act). President Bush has vowed to veto it, but he’ll break that promise.
But what are the objectives (both political and economic) of this enormously costly legislation? Can it actually meet those objectives? And are they the right objectives in the first place?
Keep reading.
First, a few words about the GSEs. As you know, they borrow money from investors and use it to buy mortgages. Their cost of capital is uniquely low for privately-owned entities, because they have always benefited from two things: they’re allowed to buy only very safe mortgages that are unlikely to default; and there has always been an unspoken assumption that the Federal government would guarantee their debt. (A third entity, the Government National Mortgage Association, or “Ginnie Mae,” actually does have an explicit government guarantee.)
But the GSEs are now being questioned by investors, and not only because they’ve suffered larger-than-expected losses on their mortgage portfolios. The spread, or difference, between what they must pay on their debt (the so-called “agency bonds”) and what the US Treasury pays on debt of similar duration is now at abnormally high levels.
That means the cost of capital for the GSEs is higher than it should be, considering that the debt is implicitly guaranteed. That tells you that investors are reluctant to be lending money for home mortgages, and it also means that the GSEs’ profit margins are under pressure. Hence the decline and fall of their stock prices.
If this keeps up, there is at least some risk that Fannie, Freddie, or both may start losing money. If they can’t keep borrowing at low enough rates to finance affordable home mortgages, there’s no alternative but for the government to take them over. And you, dear taxpayer, could suddenly be the owner of trillions of dollars’ worth of home mortgages.
What makes all of this worse is several recent Bush Administration initiatives. It turns out that Fannie and Freddie have been called on to temporarily relax the strict standards under which they buy mortgages, and which are a key reason their capital costs have been low. They’re now buying much larger mortgages (the limit was raised from below $500,000 to over $700,000), and other parameters were changed too.
All of this exposes the GSEs to much more credit risk than they (and their bondholders) are used to taking. In essence, Congress and the Administration responded to the extreme stresses in the mortgage market by making Fannie and Freddie something akin to lenders of last resort, a role they were never intended to play.
And that brings us to the Dodd-Frank Act. It’s being reported this morning that the bill will pass the Senate today (with the cooperation of Richard Shelby of Alabama, the Finance Committee’s ranking minority member), and will move to the House next week.
The basic idea of this mammoth legislation is provide relief to people who are having trouble paying their mortgages. It contemplates a $300 billion expansion of the Federal Housing Administration (FHA), which is the New Deal-era agency that insures mortgages against default.
The thinking is that there are a lot of people in danger of losing their homes because they can’t afford their mortgage payments. The details get really complex (and have been fought over in Congress for months now), but the plan is to replace existing mortgages with fixed-rate loans on a somewhat smaller principal amount. (Lenders would need to provide the principal reduction, and in return they would receive some of the upside in case home prices rise in the future.)
And the replaced loans would receive a guarantee from the FHA, and in turn would be shoveled into Fannie Mae or Freddie Mac.
But a lot of the people who benefit from this program probably won’t even be able to afford their replacement mortgages. We the People are going to make up the difference. The legislation provides for $300 billion in taxpayer money to back up the FHA’s guarantees. And even Barney Frank has been muttering that it might not be enough.
Now I’d like you to ask yourself: why the hell do we need a bailout like this? Why should we reward millions of people for making mistakes they shouldn’t have made in the first place?
Because Congress and the Administration deem it unacceptable for a large number of people (perhaps millions) to lose their homes and have to move back to rentals.
This will be one of the largest interventions in free markets in history. But the Administration and Congressional Republicans are going along with it because of the very real fear of an economic collapse if we have millions of foreclosures.
The government is proposing to pin people into homes they can’t afford. It’s the foreclosure that they’re trying to prevent. Foreclosures will lead to widespread reductions in home values, even for homes without distressed mortgages. The value of all residential real estate will adjust massively downward. This will also reduce the value of existing mortgage securities and agency debt, and will probably result in a sharp increase in mortgage rates, which will reduce home values even more.
This potential for an ugly deflationary spiral (sometimes referred to as “Great Depression II”) is what has some very smart bond-market people totally spooked.
What has me spooked is that the bailout may not even work. We may not be able to prevent a downward adjustment in the real-estate market, because the adjustment reflects reality. Housing is overvalued now. By providing a huge bailout that seeks to lock today’s market distortions in place, we may be creating new stresses that will come out some other way. The massive deflation might happen anyway. It just might take years longer to do, and years longer to recover from. And no matter what happens, the US housing market will be permanently federalized.
Is it economically possible for the bailout to actually work? Yes, it’s possible. It would amount to the same kind of medicine as a fiscal stimulus. It’s basically a huge wad of money creation (aka, inflation) that just might result in a sudden stabilization of mortgage values and end the global credit crisis. That would be the grand-slam home run scenario. There are intermediate possible outcomes between the two extremes.
Which outcome is most likely? History is no guide. The only honest answer that anyone can give you (and that includes Barney Frank, Paul Krugman, Bill Gross, and Hank Paulson as well as yours truly), is: We won’t know until we try it.
What should the goal of the bailout program really be? It should be to make it possible for people who can’t afford their mortgages (and who are already behind on their payments) to get eased into foreclosure, out of their homes, and back into rentals with the minimum amount of fuss. If we really are prepared to accept some moral hazard, then let’s give these people a small subsidy to take the deal. But let the adjustments happen and let the market find its level. This plan is where we’ll end up in a year or two, if the current bailout plan lays an egg.
Political reality, however, dictates that some kind of a bailout will happen. We’ll be rolling these dice. Hold on to your hat.
-Francis Cianfrocca
And the Israelis and the was games because Iran is on the verge of having nuclear weapons
DUH!!!
ABC: Obama’s Iraq plan “almost impossible”; Update: Video added
posted at 10:00 am on July 11, 2008 by Ed Morrissey
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Barack Obama has spent the last month waffling on whether he will stick to his 16-month evacuation plan for Iraq, saying alternately that he will “refine” the policy with input from the commanders or that the commanders will take input from him, once in office. ABC News spoke to the commanders and their officer corps in Iraq and got some input first, and discovered two points Obama hasn’t taken into consideration. Not only do they not want to leave, but if they do, they’d like to take their equipment with them:
The military has been redeploying troops for years, and Maj. Gen. Charles Anderson, who would help with the withdrawal, told us as we toured Camp Arifjan in Kuwait, “We have the capacity to do a minimum of two-and-a-half brigade combat teams a month — can we expand that capacity? Sure. Can we accelerate? It depends. It depends on the amount of equipment that we bring back. And it’s going to depend on how fast we bring them out.”
It is the equipment that is the real problem. …
90 percent of the equipment would have to be moved by ground through the Iraqi war zone, to the port in Kuwait, where it must all be cleaned and inspected and prepared for shipment. This is a place with frequent dust storms, limited port facilities and limited numbers of wash racks.
While Anderson and his troops have a positive attitude, several commanders who looked at the Obama plan told ABC News, on background, that there was “no way” it could work logistically.
This is the kind of information that policy makers usually get before formulating policy. We can rotate troops out of Iraq on the kind of timetable Obama suggests, but we’d have to leave all of our heavy equipment in Iraq. Unless Obama plans some kind of nationwide garage sale, that would be a rather large loss for the American military in materiel as well as making our exit look more like Dunkirk.
Obviously, Obama didn’t have any awareness of logistics when he made this proposal — and that’s the point. His lack of experience, combined with a hubris that he has consistently shown on the campaign trail, makes clear that he is in way over his head at this point of his career. He has no sense of military policy at all, and got the biggest call of the war — the surge — completely wrong. Yet he insists that he’s ready to lead this nation’s military during a time of war as Commander in Chief?
The troops in the field have strong feelings about premature withdrawal under any circumstances. As one soldier put it, pointing to his bulletproof vest, he doesn’t want his children having to wear the same gear in Iraq in 30 years because we (once again) bugged out before the job was finished. When Obama visits Iraq this summer, he will undoubtedly hear plenty of that sentiment — but they will also include a primer on logistics that Obama should have requested long before he started making promises about the pace of withdrawal.
Update: ABC covered this story on Good Morning America — and it gives an even clearer view of the issues at hand:
The biggest question here is — what’s the rush? If casualties drop to zero, then why not take our time and ensure stability?
Obama's Junior Moments
Jake Tapper, at Political Punch highlights a McCain "senior moment":
In Pennsylvania, McCain Tells a New Version of Heroic P.O.W. Story -- Subbing the Pittsburgh Steelers for the Green Bay Packers
"McCain is too old to be President" is a campaign meme Obama supporters can believe in. Obama never misses an opportunity to throw in a veiled reference to Senator McCain's age.
John McCain is indeed old. He's lived a lot of years and undoubtedly has forgotten more than Barack Obama has ever known.
Barack Obama is very young. He often mangles history, and law and foreign policy due to his complete lack of experience. Those Junior Moments cannot be ignored. After all we are electing a president.
Some examples:
When the Supreme Court recently granted habeas rights for Gitmo detainees Obama claimed the decision "represented a return to American values as represented by the Nuremberg trials". Of course the Nuremberg trials didn*t allow habeas corpus through American civil courts at all.
You would think a Constitutional law lecturer would know that.
In June Obama gave a speech to AIPAC, where he declared: ""Jerusalem will remain the capital of Israel, and it must remain undivided."
Obama's meteoric rise apparently didn't afford the time to realize that "undivided" was a code word, which angered the Palestinians who immediately declared that all avenues toward peace were over.
Demonstrating an absurd lack of knowledge about the region, Senator Obama had to retract his statement the next day. The candidate stated his confusion stemmed from a picture in his mind of the region from 1967, when he was 6 years old.
Perhaps prodigies age more slowly than the rest of us.
In May the Senator Obama spoke passionately about an Uncle who helped to liberate Auschwitz in World War 2. Except the Americans did not liberate Auschwitz. Oops!
Senator Obama premised his run for President on his "superior judgment" about war: Some examples of said "judgment".
January 2007:
You can throw 30,000 troops at the problem and it won*t make a difference.
May 2008:
No one ever said it wouldn*t make a difference if you threw 30,000 troops at the problem.
Maybe Senator Obama has not yet found his bearings.
And let's not forget the infamous Obama declaration that he has visited 57 states.
Or his revelation that a Kansas tornado killed 10,000 when the actual death toll was 12.
And just the other night Obama held a fundraiser for Hillary Clinton and forgot to ask for the money.
I'm not sure we can we afford to elect a President so plagued by junior moments. After all these are dangerous times. It's becoming increasingly clear that Obama is simply too young to be President.
Was Gaza part of Israel's UN Mandate
How is that relevant. The FACT was that the area was under Israeli control. YOU can whine about that all you want, but the fact remains. I'm assuming you have no guilt about living on land that was stolen from the Native Americans- through legal treaties no less. If I have your property, regardless of how it was acquired, it's still mine
I think you're mistaken. The Arab street does
I guess that's why Egypt blockades Gaza. I guess that's why the Pals are kept in "ghettos" your favorite word in those Arab countries that are so concerned about their well being
I haven't seen Iran take any action at all
Myopic much??
I guess you've missed out on their actions supporting Hezbollah- helping to destabilize an elected government along with their actions in Syria
Similar actions by the US or Israel involving them in other sovereign nations would have you wailing and whining/
Why not against Iran- because they are your last great hope to do harm to the US and Israel
And have the ensuing years of intifada improved their position
You talk of Israel grabbing land but forget the ceding of Gaza- and look at how much peace it has brought them
Nobody in the Arab world cares about the Pals0 they've just let themselves be used as pawns with continued self destructive actions.
You actually have no problem with the actions of the Israelis- you justify worse actions when they are perpetrated by the Pals or Iran or Hezbollah
Yours is not a moral stance it's a relativist choice based on your bias and distorted views
You feel the Pals/Hezbollah/Iran are justified in whatever actions because you see them as being the total victims. I choose the Israeli side. But please stop with the pussy moralizing about methods. You would revel in the death of Israel. You are so f'n deluded you talk about them usurping Your country/religion. Your self loathing- from the reflexive hate of all things American or Israeli is comical. But don't fear, your position as a macho posturing closet case will never be questioned
Is Pollution Slowing Global Warming?
A new study throws yet another wrench into our understanding of global climate change
By Stuart Fox Posted 07.09.2008 at 12:54 pm 5 Comments
Of Sun and Smog: Photo by Edwin Maolana (CC Licensed)
Wait, now pollution is preventing global warming? That’s the conclusion of a recent study in the journal Geophysical Research Letters, which says rising temperatures seen in Europe over the last few years result as much from the reduction of air pollution as from the creation of it. The research, which looked at the effects of aerosols on climate, confirms an older concept known as global dimming, and complicates our understanding of how mankind affects the climate.
According to the study, temperatures in Europe have risen over the past 28 years far faster than could be explained by the greenhouse effect alone. After looking at the aerosol concentrations in the atmosphere in six spots, the authors of the paper realized the temperature rise was assisted by more sunlight penetrating the newly pollution free skies. It seems that the stricter pollution standards, adopted in part to slow global warming, may have sped it up.
The idea that pollution may be reflecting some of the sun’s energy is not new. The term global dimming is decades old, and some believed that the reduction in pollution was the cause global warming. But now, with the link between greenhouse gas pollution and global warming firmly established, papers like this one highlight how complex the situation is, and how solutions like simply cutting air pollution may have a range of unintended and counterintuitive consequences.
Interesting that Shrillary voted against it
Takes 2 sides to reach any agreement
Remember the Oslo accords- the best offer the Pals will probably ever get
Arafat responded by backing out and creating the intifada craze