Obama Does Not Have the Will to Win the War

"It really doesn't matter how President Obama divides the Afghan baby, how he splits the difference between McChrystal and Biden. Because the war has been lost," Fred Thompson said on his radio show November 19, 2009.

"I say this because of one sad and simple fact. The president does not have the will and determination to do what's necessary to win it. His heart's not in it, and never has been. The Taliban knows it. Al Qaeda knows it. Our allies know it. And the American people know it.

"Our enemies are now emboldened and our friends are discouraged. We cannot prevail if the American people are not willing to make the sacrifices necessary for an extended effort. The case has not been made to them to justify this effort. The case can only be made by the president. This president is unable or unwilling to make that case," Thompson said.

Quote of the Age in the Age of Obama

"This country is failing because President Obama is succeeding!"

-- R. Limbaugh, May 28, 2009

Only by Obama failing can America, once again, be in a position of success.

Choice: Time to Choose a New RNC Chairman

You know, I was a Michael Steele supporter and thought he was a great up-and-coming leader of the Party — a few years ago, when he was the Republican Party Chairman in Maryland. But ever since he became a talking head on the TV, soon after he left the Maryland Lieutenant Governor's office, he has been little more than a disappointment. Too much smoozing with the enemy, due to wanting to be liked, I suppose. Now this interview with GQ:

GQ: How much of your pro-life stance, for you, is informed not just by your Catholic faith but by the fact that you were adopted?
Steele: Oh, a lot. Absolutely. I see the power of life in that—I mean, and the power of choice! The thing to keep in mind about it… Uh, you know, I think as a country we get off on these misguided conversations that throw around terms that really misrepresent truth.
GQ: Explain that.
Steele: The choice issue cuts two ways. You can choose life, or you can choose abortion. You know, my mother chose life. So, you know, I think the power of the argument of choice boils down to stating a case for one or the other.
GQ: Are you saying you think women have the right to choose abortion?
Steele: Yeah. I mean, again, I think that’s an individual choice.
GQ: You do?
Steele: Yeah. Absolutely.

He’s made questionable remarks about abortion before, after appearing to be solidly pro-life. But this goes too far. And what with the other disastrous things he’s said recently? Time to show him the door.

This is not the first time that Steele has exhibited fairly pro-choice leanings, all the while making a complete mash (at best) of exactly what his position is. From Meet the Press, October 30, 2006:

MR. RUSSERT: Would, would you encourage — would you hope the U.S. Supreme Court overturns Roe vs. Wade?
LT. GOV. STEELE: I think that that’s a matter that’s going to rightly belong to the courts to decide ultimately whether or not that, that issue should be addressed. The, the Court has taken a position, which I agree, stare decisis, which means that the law is as it is and, and so this is a matter that’s ultimately going to be adjudicated at the states. We’re seeing that. The states are beginning to decide for themselves on, on this and a host of other issues. And the Supreme Court would ultimately decide that.
MR. RUSSERT: But you hope that the Court keeps Roe v. Wade in place?
LT. GOV. STEELE: I think the Court will evaluate the law as society progresses, as the Court is supposed to do.
MR. RUSSERT: But what’s your position? Do you want them to sustain it or overturn it?
LT. GOV. STEELE: Well, I think, I think, I think Roe vs. Wade, Roe vs. Wade is a, is a matter that should’ve been left to the states to decide, ultimately. But it, it is where it is today, and the courts will ultimately decide whether or not this, this gets addressed by the states, goes back to the states in some form or they overturn it outright.
MR. RUSSERT: Is is your desire to keep it in place?
LT. GOV. STEELE: My desire is that we follow what stare decisis is at this point, yes.

And by now, if he wants to be the head of the RNC, and if he wants to be the number one face and voice of the Party, as is evident from him being on way too many TV shows, and now giving way too many interviews, then he should know by now how to give clear and coherent answers.

As it is, at best, his position can be characterized as something along the lines of: personally opposed but . . .

What the pro-life movement does not need is someone who is Cuomo-lite, some super-big tenter who tries to be all things to all people without any bedrock principles. That is hardly the model of an effective advocate (for the pro-life cause). Looking to Lee Atwater as your model, saying that “Lee Atwater said it best: We are a big-tent party” — said it best!, not Atwater had a point, not Atwater had an interesting approach, but Atwater said it BEST — is the exact reason that the Republican Party no longer firmly stands for anything and, consequently, has sunk into the abyss.

I can understand a position of “it’s a woman’s personal choice,” but as a philosophical/theological matter, not as a public policy one. I can understand a “leave it to the states” position, but only as a compromise, not as a principle in and of itself. Indeed, being in a multi-state federalist system, where different states can do different things on various issues, that is probably the best that the pro-life movement can get as a practical matter, but only by recognizing that, in protecting life in some places, it is left attacked in other places.

But isn't he simply saying with his "choice" language that we need to convert people? that we need to change hearts and minds? And isn't he right?

Yes, the battle for life absolutely is a hearts and minds battle. We must convert hearts. And, indeed, I have long and repeatedly said that current pro-lifers will not win the fight, that today’s pro-choicers will win the fight - for the pro-life side. That is, today’s pro-choicers will be tomorrow’s pro-lifers and they will win the war.

But you do not convert folks, you do not win hearts and minds, by mish-mash confusion and comments that can be best interpreted as saying that abortion is an individual choice. I know that some of the Obama crowd is pushing this “pro-choice is pro-life” argument, but that is nonsense. And it is doubly nonsense when it is coming from our own. Maybe that is not what Steele meant, but that is the clear interpretation. Whether he meant it that way, or whether he is nothing but a sower of confusion, either way, that is not the way to convert the other side. So, it now looks like it is time for a more effective advocate to replace him.

And it is hardly “rushing” to show Steele the door when I have long (several years) been a supporter of his, an enthusiastic supporter. He has said a LOT of right things, but he is increasingly saying a lot of the wrong things, and apparently coming from a wrong philosophy. And eventually, there is that last straw, and this is it, especially when one adds in his multiple other “gaffes” in recent weeks (e.g. remaining silent and thereby giving implicit agreement with the characterization of Republicans as Nazis).

As for the GQ interview, I wasn’t too thrilled with several other statements: (a) his indictment of the Republican Party as offering non-white Americans “nothing” and giving the impression that “we don’t give a damn about them,” (b) his indictment of the Republican Party as being composed of nothing but closet racists who “don’t see the chairman of the Republican Party, they see a black man just walked into the room,” (c) his apparent endorsement of Eric Holder’s indictment that we don’t talk about race, (d) his total and abject confusion (for an ex-seminarian no less!) on the nature of marriage, that male-female marriage is just a matter of opinion (”that’s just [his] view”), not sociological, much less theological/moral truth, and hence, a matter for state reinvention, (e) his slam at a couple of commentators as “bomb-throwers,” (f) his disingenuous claimed inability to remember who his first presidential vote was for, Ford or Carter (it is not the least bit believable that a person does not remember his first presidential vote, unless he is purposely trying to forget who it was for, whom I suspect was Carter), and (g) his disturbing swooning for Academy Award red carpet fashions.

Again, these are hardly the comments of an advocate, much less a faithful and zealous believer. Rather, they give the enemy bucketfuls of ammunition to use against the Party and conservatives in general. There is too much bad mixed in with the good that he says.

At the “end of the day,” Steele no longer inspires me; he is not doing the things and saying the things that lead me to want to follow him. And THAT IS HIS JOB, to rally people in a positive direction in advance of the Party. He is a poor advocate, notwithstanding his years of experience in public commentary. If he is failing to rally people and, indeed, is alienating his own people, perhaps he is not the right person for the job after all.

As for the "big tent" -- we do not need, and I am not at all interested in, a bunch of pro-choicers and pro-aborts coming into the Republican Tent. What we do need, is for those pro-choicers and pro-aborts to come into the Pro-Life Tent. We want these people to come into the Republican Tent, but with a conversion of heart and mind, so that they are no longer pro-choice and pro-abort, but authentically pro-life. The same can be said of moderates and RINOs -- we do not need them coming into the Big Republican Tent, that is, not if they are coming into the Tent and remaining as moderates and RINOs. We need moderates and RINOs to come into the Conservative Tent.

The Republican Tent is not an end in and of itself. It is merely a means by which to advance pro-life and conservative principles. To have a policy or desire of filling the Big Republican Tent with pro-choicers, pro-aborts, moderates, RINOs, etc. is to miss the point, to miss the entire reason for the tent, altogether.
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Comrade Obama

Just exactly how does "preserve, protect, and defend" mean "destroy, harm, and attack"?

The Anchoress asks:

When you voted for Obama - if you did - did you think you were voting for socialism? When Obama talked to you about “remaking America” was socialism and “not wasting a good crisis” what you had in mind? Do you really think the US Constitution is fundamentally flawed, and not a bit of genius?

Obama's actions have indeed been foreseeable. The playbook was written long ago --

Obama constantly engages in class warfare:
"The history of all hitherto existing societies is the history of class struggles."

Obama attacks and demonizes the "wealthy" and "investors," blaming them for causing the economic crisis:
"Modern bourgeois society with its relations of production, of exchange and of property, a society that has conjured up such gigantic means of production and of exchange, is like the sorcerer, who is no longer able to control the powers of the nether world whom he has called up by his spells."

Obama's call for "change":
"Of all the classes that stand face to face with the bourgeoisie today, the proletariat alone is a really revolutionary class. . . . Law, morality, religion, are to [the proletarian] so many bourgeois prejudices, behind which lurk in ambush just as many bourgeois interests. . . . Hitherto, every form of society has been based, as we have already seen, on the antagonism of oppressing and oppressed classes. . . . the bourgeoisie is unfit any longer to be the ruling class in society, and to impose its conditions of existence upon society as an over-riding law. . . . Society can no longer live under this bourgeoisie, in other words, its existence is no longer compatible with society."

Obama the "community organizer":
"In what relation do the Communists stand to the proletarians as a whole? The Communists do not form a separate party opposed to other working-class parties. They have no interests separate and apart from those of the proletariat as a whole. . . . The immediate aim of the Communist is the same as that of all the other proletarian parties: formation of the proletariat into a class, overthrow of the bourgeois supremacy, conquest of political power by the proletariat."

Obama's master plan of centralizing power:
"The proletariat will use its political supremacy to wrest, by degrees, all capital from the bourgeoisie, to centralise all instruments of production in the hands of the State, i.e., of the proletariat organised as the ruling class; and to increase the total of productive forces as rapidly as possible.
"Of course, in the beginning, this cannot be effected except by means of despotic inroads on the rights of property, and on the conditions of bourgeois production; by means of measures, therefore, which appear economically insufficient and untenable, but which, in the course of the movement, outstrip themselves, necessitate further inroads upon the old social order, and are unavoidable as a means of entirely revolutionising the mode of production.
"These measures will of course be different in different countries.
"Nevertheless in the most advanced countries, the following will be pretty generally applicable. . . .
"2. A heavy progressive or graduated income tax. (we have this in the U.S.)
"3. Abolition of all right of inheritance (while inheritance has not been abolished, estate taxes in the U.S. do confiscate substantial portions of decedents' estates) . . . .
"5. Centralisation of credit in the hands of the State, by means of a national bank with State capital and an exclusive monopoly. (we increasingly have this in the U.S., especially following the various bank "bailout" programs)
"6. Centralisation of the means of communication and transport in the hands of the State. (we increasingly have this in the U.S. with (a) the Democrat-mainstream media partnership, government ownership of the airwaves, and heavy government regulation of the telephone industry, and (b) anti-car "green" initiatives to force people into public transportation)
"7. Extension of factories and instruments of production owned by the State (we increasingly have this in the U.S., especially following the various non-bank "bailout" programs). . .
"10. Free education for all children in public schools. (we have this in the U.S., thereby ensuring state control of what children are taught)"

Looking at Obama's history and past associations, his public comments, and his current actions, it is pretty apparent that his guiding ideology is fairly in line with the above excerpts from the Communist Manifesto, and that, in implementing such ideology, he is part of the vanguard of the proletariat, the intelligensia and professional activists whose vocation is to overthrow the existing order and impose a new ruling regime. If not a socialist, then quite possibly a Bolshevik and communist.

Of course, it is possible that President Teleprompter is not, himself, such a revolutionary ideologue, but it is clear that the people around him and behind him are.

Meanwhile, the Dow is down another 80 points today. Da svidaniya, America!
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Obama's Workers' Paradise Will be a Cesspool

Part of the problem is that Dems, libs, leftists, Marxists, Obamaists, etc. seem to think that businesses, employers, and "the rich" get their money the same way that government does -- they either (1) steal it from others or (2) they simply print it.

As a result, (1) it is only "fair" to disgorge them of their ill-gotten gains, or (2) it causes them no harm since they can simply go print whatever money needs to be paid in taxes (or in additional minimum wages or regulatory costs). I don't know how many times you need to go up to them and knock them on the head saying, "Hello? McFly?" before they begin to understand that businesses, employers, and "the rich" actually have to get their money from somewhere, and if they have to pay it to the government or have extra costs imposed by government, then that leaves less money to hire employees, and less money to invest in companies that hire people, and less money to buy things from businesses that employ people.

Obama's bullet train to Marxism will cost jobs.

Moreover, the Dems, libs, leftists, Marxists, Obamaists, etc. seem to think that businesses, employers, and "the rich" are as brain dead as their entitlement-mentality constituency is, and that they will simply bend over and take it. Actually, what is going to happen is that government will take in far less than the numbers quoted as a result of these tax rate hikes. The affected people will simply work less and produce less, resulting in less tax revenues, not more.

For example, in my own business, I have worked less and less over the last couple of years because, over a certain amount (a measly $32,550), I have to pay about half of what I earn to the government. Every dollar over that amount is subject to 25 percent federal income tax, plus 15.3 self-employment tax (Social Security, etc.), plus about 5 percent state income tax equals an over-45 percent tax rate. Then, if I actually spend that dollar, add in sales taxes of 5 to 10 percent. So, for every extra dollar I earn, I have to give 50-55 percent to the government.

Stated another way, I am forced to labor nearly an hour for the government for every hour I am allowed to work for myself. Screw that! It ain't worth it. I live a simple life. Extra money is nice, but I don't need it (at present), so why the hell should I put in all that extra work only to give half to the government? My time is worth more to me than the money. As a result, I have reduced my workload, thus reducing the taxes actually received by the government.

Millions of others have figured it out as well, and they will do the same thing -- they will simply work less and the expected revenues will not be seen.

I repeat my prediction from a few days ago -- we could very well see the economy naturally pick up by the end of the year. But then, when the Obama spend-a-thon really kicks in, it will strangle the infant recovery in the crib. We will see a little uptick, only to be followed by crash and burn.

Then we will see what Osama, Al Qaeda, Ahmadinejad, Putin, Chavez, et al. have in store for us.

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Obama to America: "You Got My Money? I Want My Money! Where's My Fucking Money, Man? Give Me My Money!"

Don’t look now, but after passing the spendulus and increasing the deficit by astronomical amounts, and while tax cheats infest the Obama Crime Family, here comes confiscatory taxation, together with the leg-breakers -–

Obama to Unveil an Ambitious Budget Plan

President Obama is putting the finishing touches on an ambitious first budget that seeks to cut the federal deficit in half over the next four years, primarily by raising taxes on business and the wealthy and by slashing spending on the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, administration officials said. . . . Obama expressed determination to "get exploding deficits under control" and described his budget request as "sober in its assessments, honest in its accounting, and lays out in detail my strategy for investing in what we need, cutting what we don't, and restoring fiscal discipline.". . . Obama also proposes "a fairly aggressive effort on tax enforcement" . . .

Why are you surprised? You knew it was coming. So what if he is the one who caused those exploding deficits? He can do whatever the hell he wants, and it's up to us to pay for it.

Now the country has got to come up with Barry's money every week, no matter what. Business bad? Fuck you, pay me. You had a fire? Fuck you, pay me. The place got hit by lighting? Fuck you, pay me. Also, Barry could do anything. Especially run up bills on the joint's credit. Why not? Nobody from his crew is gonna pay for it anyway.

Barry Obama's a made guy, so give him his damn money!



Don't cry about it. Don't whine about it. Just bend over and pay the man! You're his bitch now.



Go clean yourself up. You're disgusting, bitch.
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How a Spendulus Bill Becomes Law

Here, sign this.

What? Sign what? What is this?

Just sign it.

Well, what does my signature mean?

It means you agree. SIGN IT.

But . . . what does it say? What's in this?

How many times to I have to say it? SIGN THE DAMN THING! You don't need to read it. You don't need to know what's in it. JUST AGREE, DAMN IT!

Oh, OK.
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Idiot Growth, Urban Hell-Holes

Dear Leader has decreed, “Building sprawl stops now!”

This is part of the neo-Stalinist “Smart Growth” agenda, which aims to make us all live in high-rise, concrete hell-holes, packed in, one on top of the other in hyper-density “urban villages,” where it is so crowded that it is impossible to use an automobile and you must, instead, either walk everywhere or use public transportation, where you can only go where the government allows you to go, and only when they allow you to go there, if they provide you the service at all. In short, forcing everyone to live in inner-city ghettos.

They will justify it on things like the environment, but to them, grey concrete is the new green, tall buildings blocking the sun is the new open sky, the sound of your neighbor’s activities is the new bird song, and being a slave to public transportation is the new freedom of movement. They saw the hyper population denisty in Soylent Green and they thought they were seeing paradise.

This is EXACTLY what the neo-Stalinist left is doing to Arlington and other parts of Northern Virginia, which are increasingly coming under one-party dictatorial rule. They have allowed developers to cause an explosion of growth in some very small areas. Of course, all of this insane growth is making the cost of living actually more expensive, not more affordable. Many of Arlington’s roads have become a parking lot so that, while they are on the one hand demanding that the auto companies produce a 50-mpg fleet, their “green” transportation policies are resulting in people actually getting about 10 mpg in cars that were made to get 25-30 in the city, due to all the idling while stopped and stop-and-go traffic.

If I wanted to live in the damn city, I would have moved there in the first place, don’t ya think??? But I moved to Arlington precisely to have that small-town atomosphere combined with the nearness of the city if one chose to go there. Much of that small-town aspect is gone, replaced by the “let’s turn this into New York City” mindset of the leftists who have moved here from the North, who have the lockstep support of those who moved here from “south of the border.”

How about Leftist Sprawl Stops Now?? Can we try that?
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The Seventh Century Redux

Man translates Quran without providing parallel Arabic version. Who does this guy think he is to promote his own works as holy scripture, Allah himself?

2 Afghans face death over translation of Quran

KABUL (AP) — No one knows who brought the book to the mosque, or at least no one dares say.

The pocket-size translation of the Quran has already landed six men in prison in Afghanistan and left two of them begging judges to spare their lives. They're accused of modifying the Quran and their fate could be decided Sunday in court.

The trial illustrates what critics call the undue influence of hardline clerics in Afghanistan, a major hurdle as the country tries to establish a lawful society amid war and militant violence.

The book appeared among gifts left for the cleric at a major Kabul mosque after Friday prayers in September 2007. It was a translation of the Quran into one of Afghanistan's languages, with a note giving permission to reprint the text as long as it was distributed for free.

Some of the men of the mosque said the book would be useful to Afghans who didn't know Arabic, so they took up a collection for printing. The mosque's cleric asked Ahmad Ghaws Zalmai, a longtime friend, to get the books printed. But as some of the 1,000 copies made their way to conservative Muslim clerics in Kabul, whispers began, then an outcry.

Many clerics rejected the book because it did not include the original Arabic verses alongside the translation. It's a particularly sensitive detail for Muslims, who regard the Arabic Quran as words given directly by God. A translation is not considered a Quran itself, and a mistranslation could warp God's word.

The clerics said Zalmai, a stocky 54-year-old spokesman for the attorney general, was trying to anoint himself as a prophet. They said his book was trying to replace the Quran, not offer a simple translation. Translated editions of the Quran abound in Kabul markets, but they include Arabic verses.

The country's powerful Islamic council issued an edict condemning the book. "In all the mosques in Afghanistan, all the mullahs said, 'Zalmai is an infidel. He should be killed,'" Zalmai recounted as he sat outside the chief judge's chambers waiting for a recent hearing.

Zalmai lost friends quickly. He was condemned by colleagues and even by others involved in the book's printing. A mob stoned his house one night, said his brother, Mahmood Ghaws.

Police arrested Zalmai as he was fleeing to Pakistan, along with three other men the government says were trying to help him escape. The publisher and the mosque's cleric, who signed a letter endorsing the book, were also jailed.

There is no law in Afghanistan prohibiting the translation of the Quran. But Zalmai is accused of violating Islamic Shariah law by modifying the Quran. The courts in Afghanistan, an Islamic state, are empowered to apply Shariah law when there are no applicable existing statutes.

And Afghanistan's court system appears to be stacked against those accused of religious crimes. Judges don't want to seem soft on potential heretics and lawyers don't want to be seen defending them, said Afzal Shurmach Nooristani, whose Afghan Legal Aid group is defending Zalmai.

The prosecutor wants the death penalty for Zalmai and the cleric, who have now spent more than a year in prison.

Sentences on religious infractions can be harsh. In January 2008, a court sentenced a journalism student to death for blasphemy for asking questions about women's rights under Islam. An appeals court reduced the sentence to 20 years in prison. His lawyers appealed again and the case is pending.

In 2006, an Afghan man was sentenced to death for converting to Christianity. He was later ruled insane and was given asylum in Italy. Islamic leaders and the parliament accused President Hamid Karzai of being a puppet for the West for letting him live.

Nooristani, who is also defending the journalism student, said he and his colleagues have received death threats. "The mullahs in the mosques have said whoever defends an infidel is an infidel," Nooristani said.

The legal aid organization, which usually represents impoverished defendants, is defending Zalmai because no one else would take the case. "We went to all the lawyers and they said, 'We can't help you because all the mullahs are against you. If we defend you, the mullahs will say that we should be killed.' We went six months without a lawyer," Zalmai said outside the judge's chambers.

The publisher was originally sentenced to five years in prison. Zalmai and the cleric were sentenced to 20, and now the prosecutor is demanding the death penalty for the two as a judge hears appeals. . . .

Zalmai pleaded for forgiveness before a January hearing, saying he had assumed a stand-alone translation wasn't a problem. "You can find these types of translations in Turkey, in Russia, in France, in Italy," he said. . . .

Read the rest here.
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"My vas pokhoronim!" (We will bury you)

While Joe Biden is in Munich apologizing for the United States, indicating that we will abandon the people of Poland and the rest of Eastern Europe, just as the Obama Administration has indicated that it is abandoning the people of Iran, and proclaiming that we shall have "peace for our time," Vladimir Putin is laughing in his face and treating Barack Obama as if he were Jimmy Carter. To be sure, Putin and Russia see the Obama Administration's words and action for what they are -- weakness.

Without even waiting to hear how President Barack Obama intends to conduct his relations with Moscow – something that Joe Biden, his vice-president, may well address on Saturday at the annual Munich Security Conference – the Russian leaders have thrown down the gauntlet.

First, they leaked details of naval and air bases to be established on the shores of the Black Sea in the breakaway Georgian province of Abkhazia, whose independence is recognised by Moscow alone. Then they signed an air defence treaty with the former Soviet republic of Belarus, apparently paving the way for an anti-missile defence system to counter one planned by the previous US administration across the border in Poland. Moscow appears to have persuaded the Central Asian republic of Kyrgyzstan to oust the US from its air base at Manas, outside Bishkek. . . .

Oksana Antonenko, senior fellow for Russia and Eurasia at the International Institute of Strategic Studies in London, believes all the actions are part of a pattern, intended to provoke a US reaction, and give Russia more bargaining chips in negotiating a new relationship with Washington. “In Russia there has never been any euphoria about Obama as there has been in the rest of Europe,” she says. “Russia is still very mistrustful of the US, and Putin profoundly so.

“But there is an overwhelming view in Moscow now that the Americans are in decline and will be forced to negotiate with Russia from a position of weakness. They seem to expect all the concessions to come from Obama."

--Russia rattles sabres in Obama’s direction
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President Obama Just Tired of Being in the White House, Including the Oval Office

Only two weeks after he was sworn in, President Obama already had to get away.

With little notice, the president and first lady Michelle Obama bolted the gated compound of 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. in their tank of a limousine on Tuesday. They ended up at a Washington public school, greeted by children who could not care less about the collapse of a Cabinet secretary nomination.

"We were just tired of being in the White House," the president candidly told the gleeful second-graders at Capital City Public Charter School.

"We got out! They let us out!" Mrs. Obama said as the kids and their teachers laughed.

In addition to not liking the White House, apparently President Obama does not even like going to the Oval Office. You know, to maybe do his job? And this despite the fact that he has cranked up the heat to turn the Oval Office into a greenhouse, apparently that is his idea of a green initiative (while people in Kentucky freeze to death, literally).

MATTHEWS: Brian, you‘ve been in the room with other presidents going back several years, now, in different capacities as a news person. Did you have any sort of reading on the atmospherics? It‘s warmer in there, literally warmer in that Oval Office now.

WILLIAMS: It is incredibly warm there. HVAC must be working extra hard on it. Because it was a real complaint he had coming in. Then we had lights on, today. It was like a terrarium in there. Number two, Chris, you‘ve been in there a lot as well. The detritus of the presidency is not there. I actually wrote on my blog today if I had to guess, looks like he‘s not using the Oval, certainly not for day to day work yet. No tchockes, no family photos. Nothing on the credenza. He hasn‘t picked out all his artwork yet. Those dishes still in the cabinets. He said on the record he‘s not a dish guy. Remember, he also hasn‘t used Marine One, Air Force One or Camp David yet. He just discovered the bowling alley a few nights back. They have -— Say what you will about the quality of the work and the policies but they have devoted as many waking hours to just working without settling in as arguably any modern presidency apparently.

MATTHEWS: Feng shui presidency. Thank you Brian Williams.

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Dissent will Not be Tolerated. Silence will Not be Tolerated. Your Active Support is Demanded.

Peter Berkowitz writes in the Wall Street Journal, 1/31/09 --

Bush hatred and Obama euphoria -- which tend to reveal more about those who feel them than the men at which they are directed -- are opposite sides of the same coin. Both represent the triumph of passion over reason. Both are intolerant of dissent. Those wallowing in Bush hatred and those reveling in Obama euphoria frequently regard those who do not share their passion as contemptible and beyond the reach of civilized discussion. Bush hatred and Obama euphoria typically coexist in the same soul. And it is disproportionately members of the intellectual and political class in whose souls they flourish.

As Berkowitz notes, it goes beyond mere intolerance of dissent -- those who do not share their passion for leftism are to be treated with contempt.

An interesting thing happened after the House passed the Obama-Pelosi "stimulus bill" -- instead of celebrating and rejoicing at their win, Dems got angry and attacked Republicans for not joining in. You see, it is not enough that they get their way. It is not enough that you refrain from obstructing them. It is not even enough that you remain silent and refrain from dissent. If you do not openly and affirmatively join them and voice your support, if you do not bow down before them, you will be attacked. Anyone who does not sing the praises of our Dear Leader will be vilified and destroyed.
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Iran Thugs to Obama -- Kneel, Dhimmi

From Agence France-Presse--

Iran says Obama's offer to talk shows US failure

US President Barack Obama's offer to talk to Iran shows that America's policy of "domination" has failed, the government spokesman said on Saturday.

"This request means Western ideology has become passive, that capitalist thought and the system of domination have failed," Gholam Hossein Elham was quoted as saying by the Mehr news agency.

"Negotiation is secondary, the main issue is that there is no way but for (the United States) to change," he added.
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President Obama to the People of Iran -- Screw You

Far from helping a people yearning to be free, it appears that Obama might be ready to abandon the people of Iran to more oppression and hardship. From the U.K. Guardian --

Officials of Barack Obama's administration have drafted a letter to Iran from the president aimed at unfreezing US-Iranian relations and opening the way for face-to-face talks, the Guardian has learned. . . .

It would be intended to allay the ­suspicions of Iran's leaders and pave the way for Obama to engage them directly, a break with past policy.

State department officials have composed at least three drafts of the letter, which gives assurances that Washington does not want to overthrow the Islamic regime, but merely seeks a change in its behaviour. The letter would be addressed to the Iranian people and sent directly to Iran's supreme leader, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, or released as an open letter.

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Flinty Chicago Tough Guy Scratching His Face with His Middle Finger Again

"My children's school was canceled today," Obama said, speaking to reporters before a meeting with business leaders. "Because of what? Some ice? . . . We're going to have to apply some flinty Chicago toughness to this town." . . .

Obama he kept at it. "I'm saying that when it comes to the weather, folks in Washington don't seem to be able to handle things."

--Washington Post, January 29, 2009

WASHINGTON — The capital flew into a bit of a tizzy when, on his first full day in the White House, President Obama was photographed in the Oval Office without his suit jacket. There was, however, a logical explanation: Mr. Obama, who hates the cold, had cranked up the thermostat.

“He’s from Hawaii, O.K.?” said Mr. Obama’s senior adviser, David Axelrod, who occupies the small but strategically located office next door to his boss. “He likes it warm. You could grow orchids in there.”

--New York Times, January 28, 2009

Do you really think that President Obama, et al. could give a rat's ass what you think about him contemptuously calling you a wimp about the cold weather and demanding that you sacrifice, while he cranks up the heat?
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Just Go Away NOW

People that I never, ever, ever want to see on TV or hear on the radio or read in the print media ever again. EVER! Just go away. Must we always have the exact same crowd of people shoved in our faces?? How many trillions of times must we be subjected to these moronic blowhards?? Go. Away. Now.

Lanny Davis
David Gergen
Jeffrey Toobin
Paul Begala
James Carville
Bill Schneider
Roland Martin
Dana Bash
Ali Velshi
Fareed Zakaria
Jeff Greenfield
Mark Shields
Keith Olbermann
Dan Abrams
Andrea Mitchell
David Gregory
Rachel Maddow
Ed Rendell
Paul Krugman
David Shuster
Amy Holmes
E.J. Dionne, Jr.
David Corn
Katrina vanden Heuvel
Joe Klein
Bill Kristol
David Brooks
Mike Huckabee
Bob Beckel
Ann Coulter
Peggy Noonan
Chris Cilliza
Mark Furman
Sean Hannity
Marc Lamont Hill
Ed Rollins
Keith Boykin
Craig Crawford
Arianna Huffington
Alex Castellanos
Bob Shrum
Lawrence O'Donnell
Rick Sanchez
Jonathan Alter
Chuck Hagel
and, of course, John McCain
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Once a Piece of @#$%, Always a Piece of @#$%

The piece of crap that is John McCain is apparently back to doing what he likes to do best -- oppose and attack and obstruct and frustrate the efforts of his own party.

A joke made its way around the Capitol yesterday: How do you know the 2008 election is really over? Because John McCain is causing trouble for Republicans again. . . . In some instances, he's even carrying water for his former rival [Barack Obama]. . . .

When he's not being a useful idiot by carrying water for President Obama and the Dems, he's attacking his own.

The surest sign of McCain's return to his "maverick" ways came when he caught wind of an effort by Sen. John Cornyn (R-Tex.) to delay Clinton's confirmation vote by a day, pushing it from Tuesday to Wednesday because he was seeking greater disclosure about foreign donors to former president Bill Clinton's charitable foundation. McCain found the objection gratuitous -- despite policy disagreements with Clinton, he and most Republicans consider her well qualified -- and said so publicly.

And, of course, if Obama is working to dismantle anything that President Bush did, even to the detriment of the security of the American people, McCain is all for it.

And he continues to march to his own tune. Yesterday, McCain applauded Obama's executive order to close the U.S. military prison at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, within a year.

(See full story at Washington Post)
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Important Questions About the Holiday Season!

I'm hoping that you all can help me out with something. I know that everyone does it a little differently, and some like to celebrate for about 12 days and some even all year round, but for most the holiday season does eventually come to an end (at least until next year), and I'm not really sure exactly when that should be.

So, let me ask you --

When is the most appropriate time for taking down our Obama lights?

How long should we leave up the Inauguration Scene?

Do we really have to stop singing Obama carols after tomorrow, or can we sing them for a while longer?

I know that times are tight, but it is the season for giving, so should we really set a limit on how much we can spend for Obama presents?

Now, I already have a quite beautiful image of Obama (aren't they all?), but can someone tell me where I can get an incense burner to go with it?
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The Eternal War Against Israel

Dawn Eden reports on her blog, the Dawn Patrol:

While the United Nations cries out against Israel for defending itself—and takes no notice of Hamas' using its own citizens as human shields—residents of the Israeli town of Sderot, one mile from Gaza, have lived under Hamas rocket fire for eight years.

A guy named Dave asks why there are so few comments in response to this and related posts about attacks on Israel by Hamas, as well as verbal attacks by various bloggers, including "Catholic" bloggers.

Well, before there was the "blame America first" crowd, before there was "blame everything on Dead White European Males," before there was "hey, hey, ho, ho, Western Civ has got to go," before there was "blame everything on the Evil Misogynistic Patriarchy," before there was "blame everything on the Vast Right-Wing Conspiracy," before there was Bush Derangement Syndrome, blaming every single solitary bad thing ever in the history of the world on George Bush -- before all these things -- there was blame everything on Israel, and before there was that, there was blame everything on those sneaky, dirty Jews. They are always to blame. They are always at fault.

The only time they are given vocal support is in order to (often falsely) accuse one of the other aforementioned groups of anti-Semitism (e.g. the slanders against Pope Pius XII). That is, only used as a tool in which to bash the others.

So, when Israelis and Jews are attacked and attacked and attacked, the only reaction they get is a yawn. When they defend themselves, or if they even try to peaceably live side-by-side in the same territory as the people who have sworn to exterminate them, and whose scriptures instruct them to fight and detest, as the dogs and apes that they are, then and only then does the world take notice, and then only to demand that they stop defending themselves or try to live peaceably together, and to further demand that they get the hell out of the region.

When other nations are attacked in war, and they defend themselves, counterattack, and consequently take over the territory of the enemy, they get to keep that territory, especially if needed in order to prevent the area from being used as a launching pad for later attacks. But Israel is unique in the world in that, not only were they denied international recognition as a nation for years, that is, denied the right to even exist, they are denied the right to keep lands seized from their enemies in war.

When other enemies start wars and attack peaceful countries, they forfeit the territories from which the attacks began, and they subject themselves to legitimate occupation for as long as the victorious country chooses. But when "Palestine" starts war after war (or, more precisely, continues to engage in the same war, interrupted every now and then with dishonest and false cease-fires, the sole purpose of which is to prevent the ultimate losing of the war and to give time to re-arm), it is to be given support, and given back the lands that it occupied for a short period of time, but were never part of some nonexistent country of Palestine.

Meanwhile, we are assured that the root cause of rockets and car bombs and kidnappings and restaurant bombs and masked gunmen dressed as civilians shooting innocent Israelis and Palestinians alike, is not because the terror groups and their many supporters in Palestinian areas have chosen to engage in criminal terroristic behavior, but rather, it is because of the Jews. It is the fault of the Jews. And when I say the Jews, I mean, the Jews, not the Israelis. Because if Israel were not a Jewish state, if it were Muslim or even secular, it would not be the one to blame. (If it were a Christian nation, then we would be back to "blame everything on Western Civilization" and Palestinian terror would, again, not be the fault of Palestinian terrorists.)

When thugs in Europe and America take to the street, again dressed in masks, and start burning things, damaging synagogues, damaging Jewish businesses, assaulting Jewish bystanders and observers, while shouting things like "go back to the ovens," and while German modern-day stormtroopers come busting into Jewish homes to forcibly remove Israelis flags, like some cross between neo-Nazis and good little dhimmis, despite all these things being aimed at Jews generally, not Israelis, we are told that, "no, opposition to Israeli military action is not anti-Semitism, but merely anti-Israeli aggression" and "anti-Zionism is not anti-Semitism" (even though, as said above, they remained silent in the face of Palestinian and Arab and Muslim terroristic aggression).

No one says anything, Dave, because it would be superfluous. "Hey, did you notice that the sun rose in the east today?" It's rather pointless, don't you think? Likewise, it is pointless to say much here because EVERYONE knows that those poor innocent Palestinians and radical Islamists are NEVER to blame for anything. That the Israelis, Jews that they are, are ALWAYS at fault because of the very fact that they are present in that area (or in any area), and because they refuse to recognize that this should be a Jew-free zone (world). And when it is not the fault of the Israelis, it is America and George Bush's fault.

America and George Bush are to blame for 9-11, not Islamic terrorists. Western Civilization is to blame. To be sure, it is the fault of the Christians that, 1300 years ago, the armies of Mohammed's followers attacked and conquered Christian lands across the Middle East, Northern Africa, Eurasia, and halfway into Europe, before being stopped. It's the fault of those evil crusaders, and those evil Christians who only want to subject us all to the "tortures of the Inquisition." And the fact that many of the followers of Mohammed today want to take us back to the 7th Century is, again, not their fault, but ours.

We are silent, Dave, because we hate the good and embrace the evil, calling the good "bad" and the bad "good," and because we have decided on the option of civilizational suicide. Everything about traditional Western society is bad, hence the need to tear down every existing institution and reengineer mankind, including remaining silent on anti-Jew and anti-Israel attacks, and remaining silent on many anti-American attacks. They are bad. They must go. And any defense of them must be opposed.

Everyone knows this, so why waste our time talking and writing about it?

For those who blame Israel, rather than Palestinian and Islamist terrorists, for the ongoing conflict, we might ask who is to blame for the PLO and Islamist terrorists starting, in 1975, the civil war in Lebanon, which once had large Christian population? Or why the PLO was kicked out of many Arab countries?

The sad fact is that many Palestinians are not at all interested in having their own independent nation. That is not their priority. So to say that all Israel needs to do is allow Palestinian nationhood is fooling oneself. So long as Israel exists, and Jews are living in the Middle East, these people are interested in only one thing -- killing Jews. Even to the extent of glorifying suicide bombing in children's books.

Now, to be sure, there are some Palestinians who want peace. They are tired of the fighting and are willing to live side-by-side with Jewish Israelis. But there are not enough of them. Perhaps they are even a majority. But there are not enough of them. And they are too silent and too inactive in opposing the high numbers of Palestinians who care little about peace with Israelis and Jews.
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