FOTO: Pic today comes from Will Rogers Beach. North of Santa Monica, south of Malibu. Pointless tidbit: Part of this state beach is a gathering place/ hang out for gay beach goers and gay beach volleyball pick up leagues...this section is called - affectionately - Ginger Rogers beach....hahahaha...now ya know....
Before we move onto the Make Them Accountable Headlines I feel the need to interject here that I really like Grey Poupon....it has a nice kick. - JSOM Politics and Media Headlines 5/8/09
Obama Orders Burger With Elitist European Condiment (by Pareene at Gawker) When Barack Obama made headlines by eating a hamburger this week, we were disappointed that he ruined his by ordering it medium-well. Sean Hannity, though, found something far worse....
Silly? Yes. Ridiculous? Yes. Effective? Judge for yourself: Pew Research Center
How to fight the ridiculousness-by showing how ridiculous it is: Dan Rather, Daily Show Correspondent (by Ryan Tate at Gawker) Right-wing ideologues were apparently allowed inside CBS to help drive Dan Rather from his job. So maybe it's no surprise he helped the Daily Show mock Fox News conservatives [Thursday night]. Rather's segment, a mock report about Richard Nixon eating a burrito in 1973 (clip below), keyed off Sean Hannity's slam of Barack Obama for requesting "spicy mustard...or a Dijon mustard" on his cheeseburger the other day.
It's awesome that Rather went along with this... Click through to watch the video.-Caro
How NOT to fight the ridiculousness: The Republican Death Spiral (Political Wire) Time magazine's cover story on how the Republican party-with no new ideas and a lack of leadership-has lost its way. Don’t assume the Republican Party is dead now, because exactly the same kinds of stories were being written about Democrats only four years ago.Caro
And this is the most dangerous policy move Democrats can make: Hoyer Says Social Security "Reform" Possible This Year (by Chris Bowers at Open Left) In case there was any doubt Social Security "reform" is on the table under the Democratic trifecta, Majorty Leader Steny Hoyer should have erased it. "House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) said Wednesday he's 'hopeful' that Congress will reform Social Security, Medicare and Medicaid later this year, after lawmakers deal with contentious healthcare reform and energy bills..."
Taking comfort in easy solutions (writer not identified, Free Exchange, The Economist, U.K., thanks to Economist's View) I wonder if not privatising Social Security a few years ago turned out to be a missed opportunity. Imagine, some fraction of that 12.6% (including employee and employer contributions) of your income buying shares (though the plan was not necessarily to invest in the stockmarket) right now instead of being ploughed into a government programme that will probably cut your benefits. The return on your tax dollar toward Social Security is less than 2% and will most certainly fall further. You might be saying, "But if we privatised my portfolio would be down 30% now!" Keep in mind, if you have many years before retirement there's a good chance your portfolio will recover. My comment: Social Security is an insurance plan, not an investment vehicle. Name one other insurance program that is required to show a "return on investment". But if you insist on showing a "return", it should include the money I DIDN'T have to pay to support my parents in THEIR retirement, in addition to what I receive in mine. How does a stock market investment stack up against that?-Caro
The only Obama you need to see tonight is below. Does Obama even exist if a rapturous crowd or boot licking media is not there to see him? I am beginning to wonder.
You'll notice after dismissing the highest rated cable news channel he then talks down the hundreds of thousands who recently protested. This is followed by Chicago Slim stating he is willing to talk, he then gives a short list in which he says that only HIS views would be part of any such conversation. Even now it is hard for me to fathom the depth of this man's narcissism.
I'd like to submit that we have rarely, if ever, heard a President so openly talk to and encourage himself as we did Tuesday with this remark:
"That whole philosophy of persistence, by the way, is one that I'm going to be emphasizing again and again in the months and years to come as long as I'm in this office. I'm a big believer in persistence."
He is not talking to us here - he is talking to himself. "I'm a big believer in persistence." This is, of course, laughable. The village ne'er-do-well telling himself he's a respectable man about town because one day he put on a tie for kicks.
Obama has never persisted at anything.
The "philosophy of persistence" is an interesting construction. Doesn't it feels like Michelle has been lecturing him a bit during their morning workouts? "Barry you've got to stop whining about how much work it all is. Like getting in shape, some jobs take persistence." And having really heard the word "persistence" for the first time...perhaps in his life... and realizing he has no other out here..he thinks what is this thing persistence? Have many people through out the years known of this...per-sis-tence? I must look into it.
So, like all heretofore insulated 20 year olds who've suddenly discovered something rather obvious, like say - the world is complex and being President is hard - he dashes off to make a philosophy out of the obvious observation.
W.T.F!?!? Department: The nation is livid. It appears that everyone except Ron Paul is on the take in D.C, hyperinflation is coming 'round the bend, unemployment is rising by the minute, and the Chosen One is going on LENO?
Obama truly is a punk. Is this guy remotely serious about his job? Can you imagine Clinton going on The Tonight Show during the government shut down, or Bush 1 during the the Gulf War? What f@*k*$g planet do he and his wife live on?
It is truly dangerous to install a man who has never earned anything in his life with hard work. He simply does not understand hard work - and very quickly comes to resent it. Corruption and backslapping are the norm in at least 2 of the major influences on BHO: Indonesia and Chicago. Frankly, Hawaii is not exactly known for its Puritan work ethic either.
We all know the type that Obama appears to be. Glad handing phonies. There is one in every office. Obama is a really, really good one - a sort of prom king of the glad handing phonies. Obama, never having had to exert much effort in any one job before someone pushed him along to the next, now finds himself on the top of the ladder - with nothing much to do except:
A. Actually work for once in his life. (not much evidence of this)
B. Delegate like mad, take credit for success, feign responsibility for screw ups while actually blaming others. Delegate more. Campaign because it is fun. Go on TV. Walk away.
C. Distract yourself with the perks of the top rung. Parties, Talk shows. Invite famous people with REAL accomplishments over for dinner. Insult people who you think wronged your daddy.
B and C are fully engaged after 50 days.
Feel free to hold me to this: Those who bought and paid for Obama are losing patience with him even as I type. My hunch is the clock is already ticking on Obama with some very powerful folks. Folks who can ruin presidents. BHO's job - as they see it is two fold:
1. To keep the melt down money flowing in the right direction (up).
2. Keep the people in line and believing he's on their team.
Call me crazy if ya like. Powerful folks neuter politicians regularly. They'll go after BHO if the crowd turns on him. That budget shocked a lot of people. Powerful people. The Treasury Dept ineptitude is shocking more people. Powerful people.
And Obama is not nearly as good as he thinks he is at controlling the meme and/or crowd. In fact, without a teleprompter he's closer to Bush than Kennedy or Clinton. (Clinton was brilliant at it as the Lewinsky saga proved. Also remember the state of the union when the teleprompter broke and he went on without missing a beat? Can you imagine Obi pulling that off? No. Why? Because he is not smart enough. He really isn't. The "Obama is so smart" meme is one of he hardest to defend for the Bots. Obi is not an intellectual in any sense. His only deep thinking has been about himself. Or, rather how to package himself.)
Distraction watch: A.I. G. bonuses getting wall to wall coverage...there is more here than we know. Wall to wall coverage in the current media era is a sign that A. someone is being warned. B. someone is going down. C. A much bigger story is being avoided.
Not a full proof sign - but be suspicious. Angry and suspicious. The bonuses should infuriate us.
Go on - call my loco. But when big business turns on you watch out for scandals falling from above (cable news).
Bet on the wrong pony? Uh oh, perhaps he can't fix it. Large constituencies, notably business, are voicing their scepticism openly. The President's much-vaunted $787 billion stimulus package is being widely interpreted, even by some of those (such as Warren Buffett, America's second-richest man) who openly supported Mr Obama for the presidency, as a serious failure. And we are only just past the first 50 days.
Music: Post 2000 pop from an American,Lebanese, Parisian, Gay adjacent, Freddy Mercury - ish, dee light full singer. I love me some MIKA (please tell no one as I am clearly too old to be dancing around to this music- but i do...) - Also very good singin' in the shower music.
After Hillary was nominated as S.O.S. by what's his name I posited that by summer the most in demand couple around D.C. would not be the Obamas but the Clintons. I may have been off on that, - we'll see. The Democratic base is in for a big round of Clinton nostalgia as Obama's numbers fall. Bill will, I am quite sure, artfully exploit it when it erupts.
I supported Clinton as S.O.S. because of the intense affection for the Clintons around much of the world and because she was a work horse- and I thought her focus and drive would survive and shine next to Obama's inexperience. So far that second prediction is looking good. Clinton looks like an adult next the lot of Obama administration kids. (Where is the Treasury Department? Has anyone seen it?)
NQ put forth a fine question here. What Led You to Support Hillary?
Narcissism: Check out No Quarter for some seriously creepy stuff on the White House page. The screen grabs SusanUnPC put up must be a joke...or should be a joke...
So far I think B. Hussein gets a C on performance. Not great. Not awful. He's not a trainwreck...yet... but he is underwhelming, to say the least. The self satisfaction is just this side of revolting. We've gone from "I'm the decider" to "I'm the decider. And am I pretty or what?" I would only be moderately shocked if the administration moved to declare BHO's birthday a national holiday.
The stimulus package is a Category 5 pork hurricane. (best mixed metaphor yet!) This does not mean it will not work on some level. It may. Still, thus far it is a meandering catch all bill that has no meaning.
Look at some of the names given to FDR's New Deal programs: Civilian Conservation Corps Civil Works Administration Public Works Administration Social Security Act
Whether these programs helped or hurt is not my concern here. The New Deal set out to energize and it did. Barry Hussein Obama's not so new deal is a "bailout" - a word that evokes exhaustion. A bailout weighted down with nonsense Money for skate board parks!?! That line item goes to the core of the problem. Bailout the fat cats and keep the plebe kids busy. Perhaps there will also be grants for eating nachos and watching MTV. The House GOP was ruthless and smart to vote no unanimously. A large majority of Senate Republicans will follow with "no". This will be BHO's and the Democrat's economy in short order.
I sense a massive let down is coming for the country as the Obama months unfold. Though he's measured his steps to such a degree that his alleged popularity may linger a while.
When that pesky Hillary would not quit last spring, The Chosen One told his supporters they might feel they we're on the "Bataan Death March". As reality nibbles away at the President Sunshine's narcissism - it is the rest of us that are in for a long, exhausting trudge.
My My My the Obamites are losing it. I have reports from the field that the Obamite commenters are in full melt down mode on most blogs. I don't dip too deeply into the rampant pro obama media and blogs anymore. Life is too short to be bothered with childish fanatics. The most important political take away from Obama's idiotic remarks and weak explanation is this: More than likely, HE JUST LOST PENNSYLVANIA TO MCCAIN IN THE FALL. The road to Obama actually being in the White House just got much narrower. Florida is out of reach and Ohio looks bad. West Virginia should be put squarely in the GOP column now. I would even say he'll have to do some explaining in Massachusetts. A lot of voters are not going to take kindly to him when reminded of Wright and his San Fran gaffe in tandem.
D.C. and Illinois are probably still safe for Barry.
The list of proofs that Obama is an arrogant, entitled brat is now longer than ever. There are many ways to look at Obama's latest offensive remarks. Let's look at a few:
1. The man is a political fool. The remarks to San Francisco are a violation of politics 101. In 1984 Gary Hart said on the eve of the California and New Jersey primaries to a group of California supporters that they where lucky whereas "he had to go back to New Jersey". Mondale promptly kicked his ass in New Jersey and that was that for Hart. Obama did him three better in Pennsylvania: he insulted gun owners, all religious people, and said in essence to white voters that they were bitter toward anyone "who was not like them". Nice. Especially coming from a man who has gotten quite a lot of white support. Gratitude is not the Obama family's long suit.
2. The statement is just wrong. Pennsylvania is above the national average in income and has made a small, but real come back since Billy Joel's Allentown defined it. This is largely because of the hard work of Pennsylvanians. Read this to get the low down.
3. The statement itself is a compendium of all the latte liberal nonsense that loses election after election for Democrats. One can easily imagine Dukakis opining in a similar way. One can hardly imagine LBJ, FDR, or Bill Clinton being so breathlessly condescending. both because they were politically smarter than Obama and, frankly, they weren't brats.
What he said:
Pennsylvanians were "bitter" and "cling to guns or religion or antipathy to people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations"
Wow. Really where to begin? It is an astounding list of insults. The most offensive being that religious people are, in fact, religious to the degree that economic hard times have befallen them. I suppose if one spent 20 years in the "Our Lady of Perpetual Resentment" congregation one might think of any religion not full of anti-American, anti-white clap trap was merely a bromide and sedative. The subtext here is: the faithful are being taken for a ride and are therefore stupid. Obama is saying that the religious "cling" to Catholicism, and the Quaker faith, and the rest out of empty headedness and fear. This statement is appalling and, as a religious person, very hard not to take personally.
He started the nonsense with: "They feel so betrayed by government that when they hear a pitch that is premised on not being cynical about government, then a part of them just doesn't buy it. And when it's delivered by - it's true that when it’s delivered by a 46-year-old black man named Barack Obama, then that adds another layer of skepticism."
I can only repeat this truism about the Obama Entitlement Express: when it works for him he says "race doesn't or shouldn't matter" When it looks like things won't break his way it's because he's black. The sentiment here is clear: If I lose it is because they were skeptical because I am a "46-year-old black man named Barack Obama". HE can't possibly imagine losing because the people wanted someone else. He still seems stunned that he can campaign in a state and then lose. As he said last summer "to know him is to love him."
The sentence assumes that Pennsylvanians inherently should trust him - why? - I guess because he showed up - and that skepticism is wrong in any case. The idea that voters might ask him to prove that he can deliver never enters the equation for him. I've noticed time and time again that the one question he and his supporters can never answer is "Why should we choose you?". One gets a response, but never an answer.
Let me add: His entire "pitch" is premised on the most basic level of cynicism: people will go with whoever makes them feel good regardless of who they actually are or have been. This is why the speeches are so good and the content of the campaign and its leader are so empty.
I have nothing much to add about "clinging to guns" except it is classic latte liberal foolishness. Gun owners are not particular clingy types in any case. Again: Obama just doesn't get it. In his world people "cling to guns". In the gun owners world it is their right to have them. The reason liberals like his San Francisco audience cannot ever win this argument is because their premise is always gun owners are hicks. Having a reasonable conversation about the 2nd Amendment is off the table immediately. I do not own a gun. I am for much stricter gun control laws. But knowing a few gun owners who are hardly hicks I chafe at lefty remarks like Obama's. Obama telegraphs his contempt for gun owners. I can only hope they respond in the voting booth.
I hold out no hope that the MSM will treat his remarks fairly. The ability to deny facts on the ground when you've invested so much pie in the sky is astonishing. Olbermann will probably make the blogger at the Huffpost the "worst person in the world". Matthews must be in a cold sweat about how to spin this to his fellow Quaker Staters.
The damage is done. Obama has again proven himself to be an effete, entitled, numbskull.
Go on, put the quotes below on the google - they are all true.
And it's not surprising then they get bitter, they cling to guns or religion or antipathy toward people who aren't like them or anti-immigrant sentiment or anti-trade sentiment as a way to explain their frustrations. Barack Obama
The point I was making was not that my grandmother harbors any racial animosity, but that she is a typical white person. Barack Obama
For those of you who are just weary of the primary, and feeling kind of ground down or that it's like a Bataan death march, I just want everybody to know that the future is bright. Barack Obama
There are people in the party who are very concerned about this turning into some kind of a Bataan Death March. Obama goon, David Axlerod
In this country, racism is as natural as motherhood, apple pie, and the fourth of July. The Obama family pastor, Rev Wright
For the First Time in My Adult Lifetime, I Am Really Proud of My Country. Michelle Obama
I asked Obama if she thought that her husband, as the Democratic nominee, could take John McCain. "Oh, yeah. We got him," she replied.
This is my favorite:
Anybody gone into Whole Foods lately and see what they charge for arugula? I mean, they're charging a lot of money for this stuff. Barack Obama - on a farm in Iowa.
You are likable enough, Hillary. Barack Obama
Every place is Barack Obama country once Barack Obama's been there. Barack Obama (except, California, Texas, Ohio, New York, Florida, Mass., Rhode Island, Tennessee, Michigan, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Arizona, Nevada, New Jersey, New Hampshire, New Mexico....)
The freshman senator told reporters in July that he would overcome Hillary Rodham Clinton's lead in the polls because "to know me is to love me."
Barack is one of the smartest people you will ever encounter who will deign to enter this messy thing called politics, Michelle Obama
It will light upon you, You will experience an epiphany. And you will say to yourself, I have to vote for Barack. I have to do it. Barack Obama
