Restoring our standing in the world.
May 23, 2009
“As Zardari’s offensive against the Taliban uproots more than a million Pakistanis, a seething mistrust of the United States only grows.”
So says Eleanor Clift, one of the most reactionary Democrat defenders of all time. Has Obama come through on any campaign promise?
Change.
May 9, 2009
“The Obama administration is preparing to revive the system of military commissions established at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba, under new rules that would offer terrorism suspects greater legal protections, government officials said.”
Really, “greater legal protections”??? As Andy McCarthy explains, not really:
The Obama commissions will be, in every material way, exactly the same as the Bush Commissions: they will allow the trial of terrorism suspects in a setting that favors the government and protects classified information, and they will be criticized – perhaps not quite as sharply, but sharply – by the same hard Lefties that Obama and Holder were courting during the campaign.
Again, these clowns are something else.
Change.
May 9, 2009
The Obama administration said Friday that it would retain a wildlife rule issued in the last days of the Bush administration that says the government cannot invoke the Endangered Species Act to restrict emissions of greenhouse gases threatening the polar bear and its habitat.
Thugs.
May 8, 2009
Update on the Obama Administration’s threats to Chrysler debt-holders.
Wasn’t Obama supposed to be so charming and brilliant and enchanting that he could bring people together and end all bickering? Instead, he has goons out threatening fund managers – who have ethical and legal obligations to their investors – to take a much smaller return on their (investors’) money.
h/t – Glenn Reynolds
Transparency.
May 8, 2009
President Obama’s choice for the government’s No. 2 housing job is embroiled in the largest fine in U.S. history for “blatant violations” of open records laws after the Washington State Supreme Court chastised his office for withholding documents detailing taxpayer costs for a new professional football stadium in Seattle.
Change.
May 7, 2009
The Obama Justice Department is engaged in the worst type of hypocrisy. Its Office of Professional Responsibility (OPR) is nearing completion of a 220-page report which will recommend that Attorney General Eric Holder refer former Bush administration lawyers to their state bar disciplinary committees over purported ethical lapses in the legal analysis those lawyers drafted to justify harsh interrogation techniques that critics — including President Obama himself — have labeled “torture.” …
Yet, even as the OPR report is being finalized, even after Obama declared himself open to the possibility of criminal prosecution against the Bush officials, and even after Holder promised to conduct an investigation that would “follow the evidence wherever it takes us, follow the law wherever that takes us” (emphasis added), the Obama Justice Department is relying on the very same legal analysis in order to urge a federal appeals court to reject torture claims….
These clowns are something else.
Transparency.
May 7, 2009
From Day One, Obama has demonstrated a rather self-serving selectivity when it comes to transparency. The Obama White House rushed to reverse an 18-year ban photographing the flag-draped coffins of troops arriving back on American soil. And at the behest of the American Civil Liberties Union, his administration is set to release at least 21 classified photographs by May 28 showing detainee abuse in prisons in Iraq and Afghanistan. Openness in government is fine if it hurts America’s reputation, but not if it harms Obama’s.
You mean other than threats from the White House and ensuring that investment is discouraged? (hat tips – Glenn Reynolds).
Oh, and would you buy a car from Chrysler when its majority owner – the UAW – is responsible for overseeing the UAW employees?
Obama the moderate.
May 3, 2009
According to the New York Times, President Obama is a moderate who will pick a moderate to replace Justice Shouter:
In interviews, former colleagues and students say they have a fairly strong sense of the kind of justice he will favor: not a larger-than-life liberal to counter the conservative pyrotechnics of Justice Antonin Scalia, but a careful pragmatist with a limited view of the role of courts.
Leaving aside the swipe at Justice Scalia, I must ask – why does everyone still believe that Obama is a moderate? What has he done to deserve that description? His budget proposals will $6.5 trillion to the debt over and above the debt that would have existed if current policies were kept in place, he has partly nationalized banks and car companies, he wants to nationalize health care, and he spent two weeks recently genuflecting to dictators and apologizing for America’s purported sins. Yet we hear over and over that he is a moderate.
It’s all nonsense, as Mark Steyn wrote recently, “The theater of thoughtfulness is critical to the president’s success. He has the knack of appearing moderate while acting radical, which is a lethal skill.”
So while I hope that the president picks a moderate for the court, I’ll believe it when I see it.
Party of the people.
May 2, 2009
“While volunteering Wednesday at a D.C. food bank, the First Lady sported her usual J. Crew cardigan, a pair of utilitarian capri pants and, on her feet, a sneaky splurge: trainers that go for $540.” Ho hum, isn’t she wonderful.
At least the fancy-shoed Republicans are given the same treatment, right?
By the way, for her Husband’s sake, I hope the First Lady didn’t pay for those fancy shoes with speculative Oppenheimer funds.
