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Obama's New "Culture Of Corruption"

Posted by Bill Crawford on Wednesday, February 04, 2009 8:05:52 PM
Gosh, that's a bit unfair, isn't it? I mean, give the poor guy a chance!
 
No, for a couple of reasons. First, Conservatives get smacked in the head all the time for morals issues, they being perceived as hypocrisy a priori because they are the "family values" party. This is why Bill Clinton could use the oval office as a whorehouse and remain in office. Liberals pose themselves as the ethical versions of the virgin birth all the time, and they get kicked in the head that much faster as a result.
 
Secondly, Barrack spent an inordinate amount of time on the campaign trail carping about the state of things in Washington, in the White House and in McCain's campaign. He was going to "change" all that.
 
Now he is finding that it is really hard to filll an administration with the talent he needs without coming up against the same ol', same ol' of revolving door lobbyists, tax cheats and ethics lapses. In the tax cheat cases, they are serving a party and a philosophy where the well-to-do are supposed to do their patriotic best to fork over their full share of tax money to fund the government for all those who are there to benefit from Obamas "net tax cut".
 
Things got so bad by the time poor Tommy Daschle got there that the new President did his best 'buck stops here' song and dance.
 
Sorry again, how is "I screwed up" a song and dance? Listen to the follow-on explanation- a lament about how Daschle was still the best man for the job, which is why he originally passed him up to the Senate. The vetting people knew about his tax problems, and so did the President. You see, he is on a special mission from God, and he needs to be above his own rules at times. Like, whenever he deems them necessary.
 
That is because, like many others on the Left, Barrack is a moral relativist. He feels no compunction about being consistent. Whatever it takes. Whatever Barrack thinks is needed, today. If tommorow calls for something else, so what?
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Obama Finally Shows What He's Got

Posted by Bill Crawford on Thursday, January 29, 2009 1:53:08 PM
Many moons ago, I had a friend who played baseball for a mid-level college team. They were due to face a left handed pitcher who had a bit of a fearsome reputation- good fastball, phenomenal breaking stuff, etc. Rumor had it that there were major league scouts following him around.
 
Everybody was getting the hives worrying about this guy. When game time came, the first three batters went down, but his stuff turned out to be not much better than what they had seen in many games they had already played. They looked up and down the dugout and agreed that this guy was nothing special, and could be taken.
 
Which brings us to Obama The Great. Obama the Grand Promiser. Obama the Unifier. Obama the Bringer of the New Age.
 
There would have to come a time when he passed from talking about what he was going to do to actually doing it.
 
So what did he do? He spent some time listening to the GOP caucus, and threw them a couple of bones- for instance, no Pelosi funding for birth control. But tax cuts? Sorry. What did he get from the Republicans? Bupkus. Zero. Nada.
 
The Democrats loaded the bill up with earmarks as if they were invented last week. Obama didn't even make an effort to stop them.
 
Two things have become obvious. First, the GOP has decided that the Democrats own this, and they don't want any part of it. They will not sign on to anybody in the White House labelling this as "bipartisan".
 
More importantly, he obviously does not control his own party on Capitol Hill. This is critical. He will have to govern, at least in part, as Pelosi and Reid demand he does. This, if he doesn't rein them in soon, will be the kiss of death for him.
 
If this all passes, and the economy doesn't get much better by the 2010 elections, Obama may walk out of that with far fewer numbers on the Hill than he has now.
 
Judging from his words, I don't understand why he would let that happen, not without at least a fight. His biggest obstacle to immortality is his own party.
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Gore's New Catch Words

Posted by Bill Crawford on Thursday, January 29, 2009 1:38:55 PM
Al Gore was more than happy to sign on to the Clinton administration's eternal search for better focus group tested phrases, to better sell their policies.
 
This is where government spending became "investments", and GOP opposition became the "Republican tax scheme", which was retired after the 2000 Presidential debates when focus groups essentially told Gore's staffers, "enough with the schemes, already".
 
Now, when the Nobel Prize winning environmentalist enters the capital to prattle on anew about global warming, it becomes obvious that his focus groups have told him that the ones from the northern half of the country (where most of his support comes from) have been suffering from huge snowfalls and bitter cold since last November.
 
So into the compactor goes "global warming". The latest and greatest terminology is "climate change".
 
The rest of it hasn't changed at all. The cause of said climate change is still decidedly anthropomorphic- man can't predict the weather, but he sure as hell can change it radically (I'm still trying to figure that one out).
 
Also, the hinge of history is.......oh, my God! It's right now! Last year, the critical year was 2008. Now, it's 2009. This "flat earther" (Gore doubter) wonders if Gore realizes he is starting to sound like the bearded sidewalk denizens in Los Angeles with the "The End Is Near!" signs on their shoulder.
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Iran Shows Us A New Side

Posted by Bill Crawford on Wednesday, January 28, 2009 10:27:41 PM

Now that Ahmadinejad and Obama are pen pals, we are on a bright new path, brimming with hope.

We follow the letter of congratulations to our new President from Iran with Obama saving his first TV interview for an Arab network.
 
There he was in all out glory, bragging on whatever Muslim was in his background, and ragging the previous administration as if he were speaking to a group of primary voters in West Virginia. Brilliant!
 
And what is the Itranian response to this? One: a demanded pullback of all our troops in the region. Two: a demand for an apology for all our past criminal behavior against Iran. Three: another tirade about the evil "Zionism" in the region.
 
There is your "reboot", Mr. President. You hold your chin out so they can slap it. And, while Hillary resets the State Department to go back to negotiation mode, these creeps get some more time to test their missile capacity and continue to refine fissle material to weapons grade.
 
Way to go. On the campaign trail, that was naive. In the White House, that is so dangerous as to deserve the label "Learning Impaired".
 
How long will it take President Learning Impaired to realize that we are at war?
 
Editor's Note: those of you out there who are taken aback of me ripping the learning disabled by connecting them somehow to Obama are now required to toggle the "Flag As Offensive" icon.
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This is "Stimulus"?

Posted by Bill Crawford on Wednesday, January 28, 2009 6:07:45 PM
That's all there is? $250 billion of tax refunds (on next year's tax return)? That is, EITC extensions for people who don't pay any federal taxes, posed as tax cuts. That is, taking the whole group of stipends and labelling it a "net tax cut". This is what you get when a lawyer is in charge.
 
What is the rest? A giant pork program. Go look at it, it ain't hard to find. Subsidies for smoking cessation programs. Birth control programs. General funding for "education", without any time or stipulation.
 
And what happens when you question all this? You get a lecture about how people are hurting. How thousands are being laid off as we speak. And if an enterprising reporter asks how a smoking cessation program is going to help the newly jobless, we all aren't "looking at the big picture".
 
This is all there is to the Obama magic? After all the carping and moaning about Bush's deficit spending, to load us for another trillion dollars full of Democrat Congressional pork, and then do the Obama soft shoe song and dance about his concern for the downtrodden?
 
Oh, yeah, that's enough for me. I learned my lesson from Paulson last year. The original stimulus was supposed to be a fund that would target the bad mortgage assets in the credit industry, the notion being that once those assets were neutralized, the balance sheets would normalize. This actually made a bit of sense.
 
So we shovelled a few hundred billion dollars at them, and we weren't allowed to even ask how they spent it.
 
So now you want more? Screw that! Pardon me for being un-American, but I'm not up to putting any money in Obama's hat.
 
 
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The World Versus Rush

Posted by Bill Crawford on Wednesday, January 28, 2009 5:49:06 PM
And the Congress erupts in offended fervor against one radio commentator.
 
Obama the salesman has created a personal cult that attaches him to the future of America. I guess he is sort of like the old Japanese Emporer, a divinity set to earth for the sake of all humanity.
 
To dare to stand up against this is now akin to holding up money from the poor folks and the l'il children. This must be the post-partisan world that Obama promised us all. Ye who disagree with me shall be trivialized. All debate must cease now, because we have important things to do. Hell, isn't what this what George W. was accused of?
 
But that is parlor in light of the real game afoot here: this is about the resurrection of the Fairness Doctrine, only it gets more narrowly focused with every passing week. At this point, it is about taking the radio spectrum and mandating that it carry a certain percentage of "local issues"- which is a way of demanding that, for every hour that Rush rails about Washington D.C., an hour must be devoted to school board hearings and pothole reports.
 
That's the Democrat way. If you can't beat 'em, silence 'em. They're just following the Karl Rove precedent of using federal power to silence Air America. I'm sorry, if memory serves, Rove thought they were pathetic and offered to help fund them.
 
Welcome to the new world. As it was when Clinton took power with his party holding Congress, these people have no leash on themselves.
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This Is What You'll Get

Posted by Bill Crawford on Saturday, January 24, 2009 2:02:03 PM
So Obama wants to close the Guantanamo facility, as soon as he can figure out what to do with the 250 pack rats there.
 
There are consequences we are already dealing with from the misguided fealty we've been paying to the ACLU breeders here. There are at least 60 former detainees out there right now, battling us again through the organizations they left from.
 
Yesterday's NY Times held a front page article yesterday that was short on definitive conclusions, but passing one cogent observation.
 
It seems that Said Ali al-Shiri was released to Saudi Arabia in 2007 from Gitmo. Now he has been nnnounced as the deputy leaader of Al Quaeda in Yemen.
 
Is this how we fight a war? I must remember to send a thank you note to Mssrs. Pelosi and Reid.
 
In 1942, a hatful of German military donned civilian clothes, got off a submarine near the end of Long Island and took a train into New York City, ostensibly to blow up a device there that they were lugging along with their bag lunches.
 
The plot got foiled. They were captured. A couple among them gave up their pals under interrogation (they weren't given doughnuts and coffee). In August, 1944, they finished passing through a military tribunal and most of them were executed.
 
THAT is how you fight a war. War is hell. If you don't make hell, you soon live in it. It really is very simple.
 
I hope the reality of that is not "above the pay grade" of our new President.
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The Ill Wind From Illinois

Posted by Bill Crawford on Saturday, January 24, 2009 1:49:06 PM
The Blago hurricane blows again yesterday, this time attempting to build a populist case for himself when he knows the State Senate is quite likely to unemploy him, sooner rather than later.
 
So he blathers about how the upcoming impeachment trial is not going to be "fair" to him. He isn't allowed to call witnesses. Actually, that ain't quite true. He can do so through Senate proxies. He just can't run his end of the trial as if he were the defense in a legal court.
 
Here is the bigger thing, and I can only assume he is bright enough to know that: the job he holds is not a right, but a privilege, and the rules that the Senate set up for an impeachment trial are NOT required to uphold your Constitutional rights as a citizen.
 
It is the difference between your rights as a home owner, and those of a driver (which is a privilege requiring a lisence). What the police can ask of you when you are in your car and what they can ask you in your home are two radically different things.
 
Blago will not go away. He probably won't even go willingly when the cane comes out side stage and anchors to his neck. From where I stand, he is a cartoon figure. If I lived in Illinois, I imagine I'd be finding ways to help him get the hint that somebody has pulled the welcome mat for the duration.
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We Elected Another Lawyer

Posted by Bill Crawford on Friday, January 23, 2009 3:02:09 PM
I warned all of you about this guy. He ain't a civil libertarian.
 
After signing an order to close the Gitmo facility, "within one year", IF they can ever figure out what to do with the animals they are feeding three meals a day to there, he signs another one to order all personnel (including CIA) to follow the Army Field Manual when dealing with captured terrorists.
 
That is, until you read the fine print. It also creates a commission to study whether those softie methods are sufficient "when employed by departments or agencies outside the military". Ain't that sweet?
 
Obama is a crafty guy. He knows that if he gets an incident here after seven years of Bush silence, he's dead meat. He wants to keep his options open.
 
And his Press Secretary gets to hold up the first few paragraphs to the world and announce that America is travelling down a new, civilized path.
 
I'm not going to hold my breath waiting for David Gregory to start hammering administration people on this funny loophole. Obama, after all, is a unifier. He unifies all those who agree with him.
 
So, to you conservatives out there: the guy in charge doesn't seem to be above waterboarding, if that is what is needed. Being as far from a civil libertarian as you'll find in politics, he will need a much tighter leash than Bush ever did.
 
All you Obamaites: get used to the fact that he is a lawyer, and a sneaky little putz, so confident in his speaking skills that he can keep all of you in honeymoon mode while he does whatever the hell he wants.
 
 
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My New Entertainment

Posted by Bill Crawford on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 8:36:23 PM
A little history is in order here.
 
1998: the wascally Republicans impeach a President. They thought it was because he lied to a grand jury willfully. No, it was "all about sex". I was told by many people that there was hoing to be hell to pay for this. I consider this event to be the leadoff of the great schism today between the counterculture left and the culture right.
 
2000: George Bush uses the Clinton appointments on the Supreme Court to steal a national election. The title "President-Select" is monikered, and the hatred level rises even more.
 
2002: Bush uses his campaigning endorsements to retake the Senate, including sending Tom Daschle packing for home, all after setting us up for an illegal and immoral war. Blood pressures reach critical limits.
 
2004: Bush gets re-elected through the immoral use of source codes in voting machines in Ohio, and increases House and Senate majorities along the way. The left is apoplectic.
 
2006: The Republicans engage in a civil war over immigration and allow the Democrats to take over the House and the Senate. Nancy Pelosi gets in front of an open mike the next day and says, "Let's be clear on this. The election was a referendum on the war in Iraq". Six months later, we were not only still there, but they were still being fnnded! The left was going nuts.
 
2008: The messiah gets elected, along with larger majorities in both Houses. He will sign an order to close Gitmo and strike an agreement with Iraq on an orderly withdrawal- and ask the left for patience on both.
 
My question is, when nothing changes a year from now, will the left have heads that finally vibrate and explode, like a scene from "Scanners"? What will it take before the words have no more meaning? When will he be held accountable for his (in)actions?
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"We Are One"- The Inauguration

Posted by Bill Crawford on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 8:17:00 PM

Yesterday's festivities were a quadrennial American wonder- the peaceful transfer of power in the longest running democracy in world history. I revel in it every time I see it.

The crowds were impressive, and their enthusiasm was infectious. I wish them well, and I hope they enjoy their time in the sun (more on that soon).

Peggy Noonan brought up an episode that had some heart behind it, and a reality that can't be denied. A black woman was in tears on Election night. She said to a white correspondent, "For years, you've been saying that race is not a factor in this. What I didn't realize until now was that you meant it".

I understand the power of a moment like that. Speaking as a conservative who has known since childhood that race is not a factor in my decisions, I don't sympathize at all. I take the failure of anybody around me who still holds it as an open question as having some sort of serious communication problem.
 
But that is all old news. However, those problems contributed to the "we are one" theme posed by many at yesterday's gatherings. Obama poses the new unity- as if there wasn't anybody out there who disagreed with him. There were, but I guess they weren't in the room, so they must not exist.
 
That happens in New York City all the time: we can't seem to find any Republicans between the Hudson and the East River, so therefore they don't exist.
 
This myopia may explain why the only (that is the ONE) media outlet to cover the outgoing President landing at home was Fox News. This is in comparison to the interruptions on all the networks on January 20, 2001 of the inaugural converage to cover Clinton's D.C. train station speech ('I haven't left town yet- let me take one more chance to go over the good things I did') and his landing in Chappaqua, NY.
 
Maybe Maureen Dowd was right- the crowd was wishing the helicopter good riddance and waving at him with upraised fingers (or maybe you will catch the edited version).
 
If you exclude those who disagree, you can have "unity" anytime you want. I believe this was the goal of Stalin and Beria, too.
 
I apologize for raining on such a perfect day. I can't help but chortle at a crowd that laments for years about not being listened to, and when given the chance, shuts out those who disagree with them faster than the first horn honking at a New York traffic light turning green.
 
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Who Is Ann Coulter?

Posted by Bill Crawford on Wednesday, January 21, 2009 7:45:23 PM
I had a couple of acquaintances this week query me on the nature of the Ann Coulter beast. Both of them had seen her on The View- her appearance there akin to David Duke appearing at an NAACP luncheon.
 
One of them was piqued enough by her words in response to Whoopi Goldberg to Google her, and found her other media appearances equaly vitriolic.
 
I don't expect people who disagree with Ms. Coulter to understand her. Ann understands that her detractors are no longer functional when their blood pressure rises to a certain point, and she aims her words to have them reach that point as soon as possible.
 
Conservatives understand her gig. Ann is convinced that many on the left are in the habit of demonizing and personalizing those who disagree with them. For reference sake, I've been over this subject a few times here- comparing the red meat on Daily Kos and MoveOn to that on conservative inernet sites.
 
What Ann does in print and on television is to dare you to fact check her information, and then piles on ensuing conclusions about the intelligence, courage, manliness or patriotism of her targets.
 
For many years, the left have accused the right of impugning their patriotism, and the right usually responds with, 'no, I am questioning your judgement'. Ann's retort would more likely be along the lines of  "I don't think you have any patriotism, and your jusdgement sucks, too."
 
Part of Ann's game is that one of the problems with conservatism is that they want to be understood, loved and respected. She thinks that they concede way too much philosophically and legislatively in the process. She seems to wear the hatred of her as a badge of honor.
 
I've seen enough of it directed at me for my views to at least sympathize with this. At the very least, I am unworried about ever getting any other reaction from many on the left. This is because to many of them, they are unable to exchange their ideas in a rational manner. If they are unable to communicate, they will be unable to process the premises on which mine are based.
 
Therefore, I am talking to a wall. The irony of it all is, because I can pose my ideas with the strength that I can, when communication breaks down, the onus is usually placed on me. It just has to be because of the forceful way I am posing my ideas. It can't be because the person I am talking to is completely intolerant of the exchange of ideas on the subject.
 
I''ve been laughing at that one for years. I imagine Ann has been for longer.
 
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Too Late For Impeachment

Posted by Bill Crawford on Saturday, January 17, 2009 12:06:17 PM
But it's never too late to investigate the outgoing administration for war crimes and crimes against the state. As usual, the New York Times is taking point on this, with Paul Krugman and Bob Herbert acting as tips of the spear.
 
In Congress,John Conyers has been sitting on impeachment resolutions H.R. 635, 636 and 637 for almost four years now, and would be more than happy to find some co-sponsors.
 
The incoming President doesn't seem to be on board, though. Following his intriguing comment last weekend that "we shouldn't be making judgments on the basis of incomplete information or campaign rhetoric", he seems to be allowing himself wiggle room to do things. What things?
 
How about sending Biden to Iraq to sign off on Bush's three year agreement to withdraw? What happened to starting immediately, and completely out in eighteen months?
 
How about outlawing all military detainee techniques not in the Army Field Manual? You know, name, rank and serial number. Obama last weekend: "Dick Cheney's advice was good, which is let's make sure we know everything that's being done..." Huh?
 
How about warrantless wiretaps and expanded FISA powers? Obama voted for them as a candidate, belying his own rhetoric on the campaign trail.
 
Observation one: again, Obama is NOT a civil libertarian. He will have far fewer reservations about increased government power than Bush ever did. He has come face to face with the onslaught of daily Presidential Briefings, and he doesn't have a bad word to say about Bush and Cheney... for the moment. I doubt he wants to start his tenure with the rep of the guy who allowed the domestic attacks to start again.
 
Observation two: all of you out there that want to investigate and try Bush and Cheney for their transgressions, I say go for it! Please do. You need funding? I'll write you a check. Put up or shut up.
 
But if you do, and all the support you get are thirty Congressmen from urban safe seats, and everybody else scurries for cover, does that mean that Krugman, Herbert, et. al. get to shut up about this for the rest of their natural lives?
 
Doubtful.
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Bush's Valedictory

Posted by Bill Crawford on Friday, January 16, 2009 3:22:18 AM
The outgoing President  said a brief farewell tonight. The bulk of his time was spent on 9/11 and it's aftermath, which will only be taken sincerely by his supporters. Those who can't stand him are more likely to attribute that to using the subject to avoid the other things they think he screwed up.
 
However, his success at keeping the terrorists at bay here since then effectively took the issue off the table in 2006 and 2008, setting the table for the catastrophe the Republicans have been through since. The party finished the work on that by holding forth a civil war, mainly over immigration.
 
Bush did not follow my suggestion of taking on all those out there who have mocked and insulted him over this success by flipping them the bird in stereo. They deserve no less.
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Eric Holder Will Be What?

Posted by Bill Crawford on Friday, January 16, 2009 3:07:59 AM
I'm wondering who may have been occupying the bodies of the Republican Senators today when Eric Holder held forth with his pitch for the Attorney General position.
 
I mean, who writes his applause lines? When asked about the pardons of Mark Rich and the FALN terrorists when Clinton I was leaving town, Mr. Holder acknowledges all sorts of regrets about procedures followed, consultations missed and steps omitted, and then says that the whole experience "will make me a better Attorney General".
 
What?
 
You'll have to pardon my foray into the nomenclature of twitterspeak, but BTFU, please! Let us start with the first thing that makes you an objectionable choice: the fact that you signed off on the pardons at all.
 
The cats on the other side of the globe may have to interrupt their jihad videos and share a victory drink. We are taking ourselves down from the inside. Obama is doing their work for them.
 
Editors note: those of you out there with hypertension problems when us social reprobates accuse Obama of aiding and abetting terrorism, you are now obligated to toggle the "Flag as Offensive" icon. In fact, you may have to do this every couple of weeks. This will be a recurring topic.
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