America in the World

Sir Galahad

2011-08-14T15:22:00.000-07:00

"If there’s anything we have learned about Mr. Obama during the last two-and-a-half years, it is his obsessive need to advertise his moral superiority. He wants us to believe – he is desperate for us to believe – that his motivations are pure, that he is the only adult in Washington, that he is a champion for the national interest while his critics are champions of special interests. It is not enough for Obama to be president; he wants us to believe he’s Sir Galahad.

"As for the president’s claim that some folks in Congress refuse to 'put the country ahead of party' and that they would 'rather see their opponents lose than see America win': this repeats a nasty little Obama habit, which is not simply to disagree with his opponents but to impugn their character. The Tea Party and Republican Members of Congress can’t possibly believe that the federal government is too large, spending needs to be reduced, and taxes shouldn’t be raised. And they certainly can’t believe that the philosophy they hold and the policies they embrace are in the best interest of America. It’s easier to assume they are knaves and traitors to their country.

"As Mr. Obama is increasingly overwhelmed by events, as he and his presidency shrink before our eyes, his worst tendencies are being exacerbated, his narcissism further exposed, his anger at an unaccommodating world more pronounced. A man of supreme self-regard is watching things crumble before his eyes. He is obviously not well equipped to process any of this. It is enough for one to feel, if only for a moment, some pity for Mr. Obama. These are not easy days for him, and certainly not for his country."

--Peter Wehner, Commentary

Just... Lead

2011-08-13T10:13:00.001-07:00

"The United States should be in a renaissance. In a food- and fuel-short world, we have vast agricultural and energy resources. While there are riots, strikes and unrest from Europe to the Middle East, America remains quiet. Foreign depositors even now still believe that the United States is the least-likely nation to either confiscate their capital or renege on the interest owed on it.

"China, Russia and India have enormous environmental, demographic and social challenges ahead of the same sort the United States dealt with decades ago. Our military is far superior to the competitors.

"After nearly three years of blaming, apologizing and explaining what America cannot and should not do, it is past time for a confident President Obama to remind the country that we can do almost anything we wish.

"Instead of lecturing some Americans about why they owe their old wealth to others, why not inspire them to create even bigger new profits to enrich everyone?

"And in these tough times, let the first family give up vacationing at Vail, Costa del Sol and Martha's Vineyard; trim White House entertainment expenses; and set an example of thrift for the country to match new budget frugalities.

"In short, President Obama could end the current psychological depression and acrimony by promising to lead from the fore rather than continually harping from far behind."

--Victor Davis Hanson, Stanford University

Barack Delano Obama

2010-07-09T17:00:00.000-07:00

"By fixating on the debt and stimulus plans, Obama and Congress are overlooking challenges to the economy from taxes, employment and the entrepreneurial environment. President Roosevelt's great error was to ignore such factors -- and the result was that sickening double dip. . . . Change that is too arbitrary and too frequent petrifies firms, especially before their rules have been tested in the courts. In 1938 Lammot du Pont, head of the eponymous chemical concern, spoke of a 'fog of uncertainty' slowing business and noted in the company's annual report that arbitrary government always slowed business down: 'by land and sea the universal practice under conditions of fog is to slacken speed. . . .'"

-- Amity Shlaes, senior fellow in economic history at the Council on Foreign Relations

These United States

2010-07-08T09:29:00.000-07:00

"If you're asking if the United States is about to become a socialist state, I'd say it's actually about to become a European state, with the expansiveness of the welfare system and the progressive tax system like what we've already experienced in Western Europe. . . . The curse of longterm unemployment is that if you pay people to do nothing, they'll find themselves doing nothing for very long periods of time."

-- Harvard historian Niall Ferguson

Truer words...

2010-06-26T14:49:00.000-07:00

"I think therefore I speak."

-- The World's Greatest Spokesperson in the World

Good for the Gander

2010-03-23T07:06:00.000-07:00

"Do Democrats realize that we really have crossed the Rubicon? In the future when the Republicans gain majorities (and they will), the liberal modus operandi will be the model—bare 51% majorities, reconciliation, the nuclear option, talk of deem and pass, not a single Democrat vote—all ends justifying the means in order to radically restructure vast swaths of American economic and social life. Is someone unhinged at the DNC? They just blew up any shred of bipartisan consensus when their President polls below 50%, the Democratically-controlled Congress below 20%, and health care reform less than 50%. Usually unpopular leaders and their unpopular ideas seek the shelter of minority rights and prerogatives. What will they do when they are in the minority—since they’ve entered the arena, boasted 'let the games begin' and shouted 'by any means necessary'?"

-- Victor Davis Hanson, Stanford University

Who Said This?

2010-03-19T10:49:00.000-07:00

"You've got to break out of what I call the, sort of, 50-plus-one pattern of presidential politics, which is you have nasty primaries where everybody's disheartened, then you divide the country 45 percent on one side 45 percent on the other and 10 percent in the middle... We're not going to pass universal health care with a 50-plus-one strategy."

-- Presidential candidate Barack Obama, Oct. 9, 2007

Modern Day Woodrow Wilson?

2010-03-18T14:19:00.000-07:00

"There is more than a passing similarity between Obama's health care battle and Woodrow Wilson's campaign for the League of Nations; there are also striking similarities between the men themselves.... Like Wilson, Obama is a self-styled progressive who is deeply skeptical of the Founders' creation. Like Wilson, Obama is firmly convinced of his own rectitude and his moral superiority over his political foes. As with Wilson, this makes Obama firmly opposed to compromise with these foes; he views compromise as betrayal of a fundamental belief, and as Wilson did, he views his opponents as morally defective. Obama, like Wilson, is a Nobel Peace Price winner (although Wilson actually did something to merit it)....

"Wilson's failure to compromise on the League is considered one of the greatest failures by an American president. Obama may well succeed... in the narrow sense of seeing his initiative passed into law, but regardless of whether he does or not, he and his party will reap a political whirlwind. Wilson's political misjudgment cost America, and the world, in the balance of the 20th century. Obama's political misjudgment is likely to be very expensive for America in the balance of the 21st."

-- Craig Pirrong, University of Houston

With Apologies to the Psalmist

2010-03-11T06:20:00.000-08:00

Obama is the shepherd I did not want
He leadeth me beside the still factories
He restoreth my faith in the Republican party
He guideth me in the path of unemployment for his party's sake
Yea, though I walk through the valley of the bread line, I shall fear no hunger
For his bailouts are with me
He anointeth my income with taxes
My expenses runneth over
Surely, poverty and hard living will follow me all the days of my life
And I will live in a mortgaged home forever

-- Contributed by Crissy Martinez

Never Trust A Mormon With A Wet Bar In His Home

2010-03-08T10:29:00.000-08:00

"Mitt Romney still hasn't entirely decided whether to take the pragmatist or the crusader path if he runs in 2012. Primarily, [Romney's new book] presents Romney as a pragmatist. . . . Private-school vouchers, a perennial conservative priority, are mostly 'politically infeasible,' he writes. Likewise, the conservative call to carve out private accounts from Social Security; instead, Romney backs voluntary 'add-on' accounts more like those that Bill Clinton and Barack Obama proposed. He complains that Republicans are 'overly fond' of bashing federal regulation. Someone may have to pass Thomas Donohue, the U.S. Chamber of Commerce domo, smelling salts after that. . . . Although he squirms and hedges, he concludes that climate change is real and is affected by human activity. He praises federal energy regulation for squeezing more efficiency from cars and home appliances. And Romney says that increased domestic production, although worthwhile, wouldn't 'appreciably' reduce our dependence on foreign oil."

-- Ronald Brownstein, National Journal

Dr. Sowell Tells It Straight

2010-02-24T10:43:00.000-08:00

"Personal responsibility is a real problem for those who want to collectivize society and take away our power to make our own decisions, transferring that power to third parties like themselves, who imagine themselves to be so much wiser and nobler than the rest of us."

-- Thomas Sowell

Even Schwarzenegger Gets This

2010-01-07T11:30:00.000-08:00

"Health care reform, which started as noble and needed legislation, has become a trough of bribes, deals and loopholes. You've heard of the bridge to nowhere. This is health care to nowhere. California's congressional delegation should either vote against this bill that is a disaster for California or get in there and fight for the same sweetheart deal Senator Nelson of Nebraska got for the Cornhusker State. He got the corn; we got the husk."

-- California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, withdrawing his support for President Obama's health care plan during his State of the State address this week

Where is the 'Global Warming?'

2009-12-30T09:56:00.001-08:00

"The cover of Al Gore's new book, Our Choice: A Plan to Solve the Climate Crisis, features a satellite image of the globe showing four major hurricanes -- results, we're meant to believe, of man-made global warming. All four were photoshopped. Which is nice symbolism, because in a sense the whole hurricane aspect of warming has been photoshopped. True, both greenhouse gas emissions and levels in the atmosphere are at their highest, but this year had the fewest hurricanes since 1997, according to the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration. For the first time since 2006 no hurricanes even made landfall in the U.S.; indeed hurricane activity is at a 30-year low."

-- Michael Fumento, Forbes

Barack W. Bush

2009-12-07T17:50:00.000-08:00

"Well, let's see. I'm trying to sum up President Obama's first 11 months in office: He gave billions to Wall Street, cracked down on illegal immigrants getting health care, and he's sending 30,000 more troops to Afghanistan. You know something? He may go down in history as our greatest Republican president ever!"

-- Jay Leno, The Jay Leno Show

Ironies of Fort Hood

2009-11-12T07:00:00.000-08:00

"Major Nidal Malik Hasan was revealed Monday to have contacted Al-Qaeda before he killed thirteen U.S. soldiers and wounded dozens at Fort Hood Thursday. He jumped on a desk, shouted 'Allah Akbar' and opened fire. The FBI is still looking for a motive...

"Sgt. Kimberly Munley ended Major Hasan's Fort Hood rampage Thursday. She faced him and shot him four times as he shot her in the leg. She's buying a display case for the Medal of Valor and retaining a defense lawyer for the hate crimes prosecution...

"Fort Hood shooter Major Nidal Malik Hasan was an Army psychiatrist who flipped out and started killing people last week. The U.S. government paid for his medical school tuition, paid for his training, and certified him as a competent doctor. This latest foray into government health care is making everyone appreciate their HMO...

"Major Hasan's fellow soldiers said they knew the Fort Hood shooter was radical but they were afraid they'd be accused of discrimination against Muslims if they reported him. Political correctness has now killed more people than swine flu."

-- Argus Hamilton

Afghanistan Elections

2009-11-04T11:56:00.000-08:00

"The only opponent to Afghan President Hamid Karzai has backed out of the planned recount. He's not going to be in the race. He says he wants to spend more time with his family. And not get killed."

-- Jay Leno, The Jay Leno Show

"Abdullah Abdullah just quit next week's runoff election against Afghanistan's President Hamid Karzi. Abdullah Abdullah said, he was just following in the footsteps of his role model, Palin Palin."

-- Jimmy Fallon, Late Night

"So Abdullah Abdullah says he is pulling out because he wants to spend more time with his wife, Paula Abdullah...

"No runoff election in Afghanistan. Apparently a second election would be way too expensive to rig...

"Abdullah Abdullah may be out of the race, but they say in four years his son will be on the ballot. That would be Abdullah W. Abdullah."

-- David Letterman, The Late Show

Obama Golfs -- A Lot

2009-10-29T09:59:00.000-07:00

"According to CBS News, President Obama has played more golf in nine months than George Bush in nearly three years. Actually, Obama's a good golfer. You know what his handicap is? Joe Biden."

–- Jay Leno, The Jay Leno Show

"They say now that President Barack Obama's playing a lot of golf. Did you know he plays a lot of golf? I didn't know that. Good for him. Play golf. Play all the golf you want. The world is going to hell anyway. What possible difference could it make if he's playing golf?

"In fact, he has played more golf in his few months in office than George Bush played in eight years. So Barack Obama, playing more golf than George Bush. But to be fair, President Bush played more mini-golf."

-- David Letterman, The Late Show

The Real Questions

2009-10-28T15:00:00.000-07:00

"Instead of solely considering 'costs' [of ObamaCare], shouldn't we ask if Americans are willing to 1) Die sooner from cancer, 2) give up access to specialists, 3) be refused safer, more accurate diagnostic imaging, 4) lose the most accessible screening programs, and 5) lose their autonomy in pursuing treatments for their families?

"Shouldn't we ask if Americans want to replace the most advanced and successful medical care in history with the restricted care and lower cost social programs of Europe, to insure the less than 5 percent of people who don't buy insurance but receive care anyway?"

-- Scott W. Atlas, M.D., Chief of Neuroradiology, Stanford University Medical Center

Here, Kitty Kitty...

2009-10-26T17:01:00.000-07:00

"I've always wanted to read an environmental book that was brutally honest about the size of the sacrifices the greens are demanding of average people. Now Brenda and Robert Vale, two professors at New Zealand's Victoria University and winners of a United Nations Global 500 Award for Environmental Achievement, have filled that market niche. Their new book is provocatively titled: Time to Eat the Dog? The Real Guide to Sustainable Living.

"They argue that the carbon pawprint of a typical canine is twice that of an SUV that's driven 6,000 miles a year. The main reason is all the energy that goes into producing meat for its diet. Keeping a cat is the equivalent of owning a Volkswagen Golf. Two hamsters are as bad for the planet as owning a plasma TV.

"In order to stave off global warming, the Vales suggest pet owners swap dogs and cats for creatures they can eat, such as chickens or rabbits. 'There is certainly some truth in the fact that if we have edible pets like chickens for their eggs and meat, and rabbits and pigs, we will be compensating for the impact of other things on our environment,' the authors write.

"The authors issue a dire warning about the eco-hazards of a wealthy lifestyle. If everyone shared the standard of living of Americans, they say, humanity would need five planet Earths to sustain itself. Thus it's allegedly time to take drastic measures: People should ride bikes for all but the longest errands, and they should give up holidays. The authors even offer marriage advice: Don't get divorced until you find a new partner so you can save the environmental cost of maintaining two homes.

"Robert Vale says the couple wrote their book because current efforts fall so pitifully short in tackling the world's environmental problems. 'There are so many wussy sustainability books out there. It's a bit more complex than grocery bags and light bulbs.'"

-- John Fund, Wall Street Journal

Bending the Curve -- Up!

2009-10-23T10:47:00.001-07:00

"Supposedly the whole point of ObamaCare was to 'bend the curve' and reduce the growth rate of health-care spending. Everyone now knows it will do the opposite -- as at least one corner of the Obama Administration is willing to admit.

"This week, the Office of the Actuary at the Centers for Medicare & Medicaid Services, or CMS, released a cost estimate for the House health bill. Its projections mostly track those issued by the Congressional Budget Office, but CMS does ask some questions that CBO so far hasn't pursued. The results aren't pretty.

"CMS estimates the House bill would add 2.1 percentage points to the (already high) annual growth rate of national health spending. In 2019, when the second decade of ObamaCare would kick in, the bill would add 2.7 points to the growth rate.

"CMS also observes that the 'game changers' President Obama and especially budget chief Peter Orszag used to promote, like comparative effectiveness research and more wellness programs, are actually nonchangers. They'll save a pitiful $2.1 billion over a decade -- about 0.002% of the $1.042 trillion in new spending authorized by the House bill.

"Even the good news isn't so good. CMS says spending growth would be even higher except that so many more people will receive their care from government, allowing Washington to economize through 'sizable discounts imposed on providers,' which is one way of putting it. (Another way of putting it: Expect long lines and shabbier treatment as fewer doctors are willing to treat government-insured patients.)

"In fact, CMS estimates that seven years after the bill's provisions take effect, government's share of total health-care spending will have risen to 55% from today's 47%. Single payer, here we come.

"The White House is telling nervous Democrats to ignore the report, since the House bill will be merged with others before a final product is completed. As one Hill staffer puts it: 'Isn't that a bit like saying don't worry about the ingredients of a cigarette because once we roll them all together it will be healthy for you?'"

-- Joseph Rago, Wall Street Journal

Obama Wins It All

2009-10-14T16:41:00.000-07:00

"Oklahoma Sooners quarterback Sam Bradford and Florida Gators signal-caller Tim Tebow returned to action Saturday after being out with injuries. The pressure's off now. They can relax and concentrate on winning after Sunday's announcement that President Obama had won the Heisman Trophy...

"The Los Angeles Dodgers swept the St. Louis Cardinals in three games to win the National League Divisional Series in St. Louis Saturday. The TV ratings were huge. President Obama watched all three games and was named the series Most Valuable Player...

"Paranormal Activity sold out at theaters Saturday by showing video proof of ghost activity. It spotlights the world's unexplained phenomena. The movie got a boost Friday when President Obama won the Nobel Peace Prize the same day he bombed the moon...

"President Obama conceded Friday he was surprised to learn he had won the Nobel Peace Prize and had done nothing to earn it. That's how nervous the world is about the U.S. They will hand us a peace prize just for doing nothing for nine months, the same way Northern Europe used to thank God whenever the Vikings would stay home all summer."

-- Argus Hamilton

Olympic Dreams

2009-10-12T19:36:00.000-07:00

"Michelle Obama said she sat on her father's lap watching Carl Lewis win all his medals in the Olympics. She was twenty years old that year. Oprah Winfrey can't believe she confessed to the IOC instead of on her show...

"Jesse Jackson blamed Chicago's Olympics loss on the world's hatred of George W. Bush. We're still in Iraq and Afghanistan, still in a recession & still haven't shut down Guantanamo. When the IOC considered the U.S. bid, they thought Bush was still president."

-- Argus Hamilton

Jay On A Roll!

2009-10-02T08:30:00.000-07:00

"If you saw '60 Minutes,' you probably saw this: President Obama coming under fire, because he has only spoken to the U.S. commander in Afghanistan once in the last six months. Well, whose fault is that? Hey, if the general wants to talk to President Obama, get a talk show! That's how you do it...

"Actually, to be fair, I thought this was nice, President Obama said he's been very busy lately, but he would be willing to add the general as a Facebook friend...

"A new book is coming out by John Edwards' campaign official, a guy named Andrew Young. I guess they were quite close friends. Young now says there is sex tape of John Edwards and his mistress. Well, of course, people are stunned by this. John Edwards letting someone else get in front of the camera? I don't think so!

"...You know, I think it is true, because at one point on the tape, at the height of passion, you can hear John Edwards screaming out his own name...

"Senator Chris Dodd, who is head of the Senate Banking Committee, is pushing for one super-regulator to oversee all the banks. He said his goal to restore more confidence in the banking system. You know what would restore more confidence in the banking system? If Chris Dodd wasn't head of the Senate Banking Committee!"

-- Jay Leno, The Jay Leno Show

ObamaCare

2009-10-01T14:39:00.000-07:00

"The public is not as dumb as it's made out to be, and Mr. Obama's public option died a bipartisan death yesterday in the Senate Finance Committee. What's left is a package of 'reforms' that are mere trite extensions of what we've been doing for decades. That is, piling up mandates on private insurers and then lying that this somehow isn't driving up the cost of health insurance; piling up subsidies for health consumption and then lying that this somehow isn't responsible for runaway health-care spending."

-- Holman Jenkins Jr., Wall Street Journal

Samuelson Gets It

2009-09-30T09:33:00.000-07:00

"Politicians, in their most self-important moments, see themselves as instruments of national destiny. They yearn to be remembered as the architects and agents of great social and economic transformations. They want to be at the signing ceremony; they want a pen. Ordinary Americans are rightly suspicious of this exercise in collective ego gratification, which has gripped Obama and many of his congressional allies [as they draft their health care reform bills]. Even when the goals are worthy -- as they are here -- the temptation to exaggerate, simplify and sugarcoat often proves irresistible."

-- Robert Samuelson, Washington Post

VDH is Truly Brilliant

2009-09-29T10:26:00.000-07:00

"Note how baffled the administration is by sinking polls, tea parties, town halls, and, in general, 'them' -- the vast middle class, which, as we learned during the campaign, clings to guns and Bibles. For many in the academic community who have not worked with their hands, run businesses, or ventured far off campus, Middle America is an exotic place inhabited by aborigines who bowl, don't eat arugula, and need to be reminded to inflate their tires. They are an emotional lot, of some value on campus for their ability to 'fix' broken things like pipes and windows, but otherwise wisely ignored. Professor Chu, Obama's energy secretary, summed up the sense of academic disdain that permeates this administration with his recent sniffing about the childish polloi: 'The American people . . . just like your teenage kids, aren't acting in a way that they should act.'"

-- Victor Davis Hanson, Stanford University

Taylor & Kanye : )

2009-09-23T05:52:00.000-07:00

"Even the President is talking about Kanye West. Did you hear about this? In an off the record remark recorded by ABC, Obama said that Kanye West was a quote, unquote, 'jackass.' In even bigger news, ABC doesn't understand the meaning of the phrase 'quote, unquote, off the record.'...

"Kanye was pretty hurt when he heard the President called him a 'jackass.' But then Joe Biden said, 'Ah, you get used to it.'"
-- Jimmy Fallon, Late Night

"Of course, you know President Obama yesterday created quite a stir, because he apparently called Kanye West a jackass. Yeah, well, some people are now upset with President Obama for calling Kanye a jackass. They're upset about it. Yeah, and Joe Biden is furious, because 'Jackass' is his Secret Service code name.'"
-- Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

"Joe Wilson is now the only United States congressman to be formally rebuked for speaking out while the President was giving an address. That could explain his Secret Service codename, 'Kanye.'"
-- Jimmy Fallon, Late Night

"Well, here's a story that won't go away. Congressman Joe Wilson has refused Democrats' demand to apologize to Congress on the House floor, to which Kanye West said, 'I'll do it. That's okay, I'll do it.''
-- Jay Leno, The Jay Leno Show

"This Kanye West/Taylor Swift thing... even former President Bush spoke out about it today. He said, 'Kanye West doesn't care about white people!'...

"Been a busy week for President Obama. I notice that he's having Kanye West and Taylor Swift to the White House for a 'root beer summit' this weekend. See, she's only 19. So, it's got to be root beer."
-- Jay Leno, The Jay Leno Show

Argus!!!!

2009-09-21T14:47:00.000-07:00

"President Obama scrapped the missile defense system designed to protect Poland from Russian attack Thursday on the seventieth anniversary of Russia's invasion of Poland. This explains why Obama removed the bust of Winston Churchill from the Oval Office and sent it back to the British Embassy. He wanted one of Neville Chamberlain...

"President Obama skipped Fox News on his media blitz Sunday because he said Fox is devoted solely to attacking him. That's fair. He felt burned after they aired undercover tapes showing ACORN telling him how to turn self-pity into world domination. ..

"President Obama will be the first U.S. president to chair the U.N. Security Council this week. The U.N. is traditionally where Third World leaders air their grievances against U.S.-British imperialism and Zionism. Obama was elected chairman by acclamation."

-- Argus Hamilton

Bin Laden Watches the VMAs

2009-09-16T09:12:00.000-07:00

"Osama bin Laden has released a new audio recording slamming the President, America, Israel and the wars in Afghanistan and Iraq. Then at the end, when he's really worked up, he yells, 'And Beyoncé had one of the best videos of all time!'"

-- Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

"Osama bin Laden released a new 11-minute audio tape, where he calls President Obama powerless in the war in Afghanistan. Well, that was the first six minutes. He gave Taylor Swift the last five to finish her acceptance speech."

-- Jimmy Fallon, Late Night

We're All Socialists Now

2009-09-15T11:18:00.000-07:00

"We are all Socialists now! Or, we will be soon. . . . The Baby Boomers know that their kids won't support them in their old age, so they must expect that the government will take care of them during their senior years. Because we are living longer, we are naturally becoming even more socialistic. 'Speak for yourself,' you might be thinking. Let me ask you one question: Are you willing to support your parents in their old age without any government support whatsoever? If your answer is 'No,' then you are a Socialist. If your answer is 'Yes,' then you are probably Chinese. . . . The longer we live, the more health care we want to keep us going. But we know that we can't afford it, and that our kids won't pay for it. Hence, we will all turn to the government to pay for it with borrowed money. The collapse of fiscal discipline in Washington, DC and the ballooning federal deficit reflects our national embrace of old-age Socialism."

-- Wall Street economist Ed Yardeni

Obama Talks to the Kids!

2009-09-10T11:11:00.000-07:00

"Earlier today, President Obama delivered a speech to America's schoolchildren. And he encouraged them to work hard and study hard. Yeah, then he said if that doesn't work, grab the seat next to the Asian kid."

-- Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

"During his speech to American school children earlier today, President Obama said that what you make of your education will decide nothing less than the future of this country. But no pressure...

"The President also said that kids -- he told them if they study hard, the United States will continue to prosper. Then he added, 'But just to be safe, bone up on your Chinese.'"

-- Jimmy Fallon, Late Night

The Latest News

2009-09-03T07:45:00.000-07:00

President Obama's enjoying himself. He's having his vacation in Martha's Vineyard all week. So far — this is what the news says — so far, he's played tennis, golf; he's gone swimming. Now it's rumored he may play a game of bocce ball. It's true. In other words, America is still waiting for its first black president...

"The latest rumor is that President Obama is going to have dinner on Martha's Vineyard with Oprah Winfrey. That's right, ladies and gentlemen. The most powerful person in the free world is going to have dinner with President Obama."

-- Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

"The Obama family is taking a vacation up there in Martha's Vineyard, it is a good time for the president to take a vacation, I think. I mean, everything is fixed, right? ...And they are talking about Obama may play a round of golf with Tiger Woods. That is a little different than President Clinton on vacation, he just liked to play around...

"Did you see the picture of Barack Obama out bicycling with the kids? He's not wearing a helmet... I believe the President is the most prominent Democrat to go without protection since John Edwards."

-- David Letterman, The Late Show

"Meanwhile, in New York, Governor David Paterson has been busy for the last couple of weeks trying to shave off his beard. And he did it... This makes Governor Paterson the first governor to get rid of his beard since former New Jersey Governor Jim McGreevey filed for divorce back in, I think, '06."

-- Jimmy Kimmel, Jimmy Kimmel Live

"Hey, you know who's back in town? Eliot Spitzer. Former governor of New York Eliot Spitzer is back in town, and he's going to run for governor again. He says he wants to spend less time with his family... Do you remember Governor Eliot Spitzer, the guy who pioneered the 'Cash for Hookers' program?"

-- David Letterman, The Late Show

"I read today that former New York Governor Eliot Spitzer is considering running for the Senate. In fact he's already holding fundraisers: $500 for the full hour and $300 for a half hour."

-- Jimmy Fallon, Late Night

Forgetting Who Is In Charge

2009-08-26T09:55:00.000-07:00

"It is a measure of just how politically tone deaf the Obama team has become that they choose to attack ordinary Americans rather than absorb the message being sent. They have become so used to the echo chamber of their fellow liberals and the mainstream media (I repeat myself) that they still seem unaware of the vast gulf between themselves and citizens motivated enough to turn out in record numbers to express their concerns. . . . [President Obama] persists in decrying 'misinformation' -- implying that voters are dim and have been duped by nefarious forces. It is a politically dangerous place for a president to be -- defaming voters and ignoring their pleas. It is one thing to go to war with the opposition party but quite another to go to war with voters. In his hubris, Obama has forgotten who is in charge."

-- Jennifer Rubin, writing on the health care town halls at Commentary magazine

If You Don't Wear Birkenstocks...

2009-08-10T09:52:00.000-07:00

"In any event, it's true that people who believe in health care choices and free markets are zombies. For one thing, they are entirely too well-dressed to contemplate serious issues independently -- and thank you, Sen. Barbara Boxer of California, for pointing that out. A man without Birkenstocks, after all, is a man without a soul. Organizing and protesting, as any sensible and compassionate citizen already understands, is exclusively the bailiwick of ideologically diverse and freethinking groups, such as unions. And really, the most galling aspect of this entire spurious uprising is the rumor that protestors are actually organized. Can you imagine?"

-- David Harsanyi, Denver Post, on Democrats' attempt to discredit town-hall uprisings against ObamaCare

Smokin'!!

2009-06-30T07:30:00.000-07:00

“President Obama declared Tuesday he's ninety-five percent cured of smoking but wouldn't say when he last smoked. This is the difference between his generation and the last one. He admits that he used cocaine but he's got to lie about smoking.

“President Obama snapped at reporters Tuesday when they asked if he has quit smoking. His office aides carry Nicorette gum at all times in case he gets a craving. Think of all the political careers that could be saved if somebody would invent Infidelity Gum.

“The White House announced Wednesday that President Obama will stop in Rome and visit with Pope Benedict during his trip to Italy in July. The president wasn't able to comment about the meeting. He was at the National Cathedral posing for a wall."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

"And President Obama, this guy takes everything seriously. He's very upset about what's going on in Iran. As a matter of fact, today he announced that he's going to stop smoking Camels."

-- David Letterman, The Late Show

Press Coverage

2009-06-26T08:55:00.000-07:00

"I have to admit, though, it wasn’t easy coming up with fresh material for this dinner. A few nights ago, I was up tossing and turning, trying to figure out exactly what to say. Finally, when I couldn’t get back to sleep, I rolled over and asked Brian Williams what he thought."

-- Pres. Barack Obama, Radio & TV Correspondents Dinner 2009

"CBS News and ABC News both suffered record low TV ratings last week with Katie Couric and Charlie Gibson ducking out of town to avoid blame. It's their White House coverage. If viewers wanted to watch a cheerleading competition they'd watch ESPN2."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

Recent History

2009-06-25T09:01:00.000-07:00

"L.A. Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa announced in CNN's newsroom Monday he won't run for governor. The mayor's wife left him when he began dating female news anchors last year. He made the announcement at CNN after all the women at Fox News turned him down.

"President Obama signed the tobacco bill into law in the Rose Garden Monday. He signed the bill while standing next to a kids' group for a tobacco-free America. The ceremony was held outside because the Oval Office smells like cigarettes... He himself promised his wife two years ago he would quit smoking if he ran for president. And now he has to take her to Paris for dinner twice a month to keep her from leaving him."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

"[Iran's] Supreme Leader said that the elections were not rigged. Well, that's good enough for me... But the Iranian government is planning a curfew because things are getting so crazy in Iran. And I thought if there is one thing an angry mob respects, by God, it's a curfew, isn't it?"

"Ahmadinejad has declared himself the winner of the election and is planning his inauguration. And I said, 'Well, why not? The country is really in a party mood.'"

"And the leader of Iran's opposition party, Mousavi, the guy who apparently lost in the election, says he's ready to become a martyr. Don't kid yourselves. It's tough being a martyr nowadays, really. I mean, with the economy and all the budget cuts. When you die now, because of the economy, you're only going to be greeted by 35, maybe 40 virgins, tops."

-- David Letterman, The Late Show

"[Son of the former Shah of Iran] Reza Pahlavi backed the protesters in Tehran Monday. His family was overthrown by a violent protest in the 70's. Thirty years later it is impossible to describe the depth of the hostility some people felt toward disco...

"Hillary Clinton met with the British Monday to review options with Iran... She's reverting to old habits. She told the Foreign Secretary that her elbow was broken on the runway in Tehran by the Iranian Revolutionary Guard."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

Barack on Iran

2009-06-24T10:09:00.000-07:00

"President Obama watched his words about Iran Monday and ordered the U.S. Navy to avoid a showdown in the Gulf. He intends to play to his strengths. He doesn't want to say anything about the situation in Iran because he's really only comfortable talking about himself...

"Iranian demonstrators faced tear gas and water cannons and even gunfire Sunday as they demanded an honest election. Barack Obama is upset by the videos. They're pulling YouTube viewers away from the clip of him killing the fly with his bare hand."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

Random Thoughts

2009-06-23T08:23:00.001-07:00

"President Obama was ripped by animal rights activists for killing a fly during a TV interview. It was grim. He slapped it barehanded and it fell dead to the Oval Office carpet, where it lies next to the president of GM and three Inspector Generals."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

"This is all very ironic, because this is the week that the gay people in America finally really had it up to here with Barack Obama, because he won't come out for gay marriage. He threw them a bone with federal benefits. They didn't like that. They said, 'We are not satisfied and we are feeling neglected.' He said, 'Well, that's almost like being married.'"

--Bill Maher, Real Time

"President Barack Obama spoke on the phone with Lakers coach Phil Jackson and with Dan Bylsma, coach of the Stanley Cup-winning Pittsburgh Penguins. That's cool. Yeah. And in a related story, Joe Biden had a conference call with Tito Jackson and an actual penguin...

"On Wednesday night, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton broke her elbow, so yesterday, she worked from home. Mm-hmm. Yeah, which explains why Bill Clinton spent the day in the backyard forming the words 'Help Me' with garden gnomes."

-- Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

ObamaCare

2009-06-22T20:19:00.000-07:00

“ABC will give President Obama an hour of free primetime Wednesday to promote his health care plan. The network refused to air commercials during the broadcast that express any opposing points of view on health care. It's only a matter of time before Barack Obama sheds the title of President to become the Kaiser Permanente…

“House Democrats released a trillion dollar health care bill Friday without any mention of how they'll pay for it. They say they hope to get Americans sold on its benefits before they reveal its cost. It's a technique they learned from crack dealers.”

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

The Saga of Iran Continues

2009-06-22T15:28:00.000-07:00

"Well, here's more big news going on in Iran. You folks been following the Iranian elections? Well, here it is. It's President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad and his opponent, Mir Hussein Moussavi. And they had one of those friendly bets. If Ahmadinejad wins the election, he gets a crate of figs, see. If Moussavi wins the election, he gets brutally slain."

--David Letterman, The Late Show

"President Obama refused to criticize Iran's bloody crackdown Tuesday, saying he won't interfere. He referred to the Ayatollah as 'Supreme Leader.' When Barack Obama returned the bust of Winston Churchill he replaced it with one of Neville Chamberlain."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

This Is No Joke

2009-06-22T14:22:00.000-07:00

"The most surprising thing about the first half-year of Barack Obama's presidency, at least in the realm of foreign policy, has been its indifference to the issues of human rights and democracy. No administration has ever made these its primary, much less its exclusive, goals overseas. But ever since Jimmy Carter spoke about human rights in his 1977 inaugural address and created a new infrastructure to give bureaucratic meaning to his words, the advancement of human rights has been one of the consistent objectives of America's diplomats and an occasional one of its soldiers. This tradition has been ruptured by the Obama administration."

-- Joshua Muravchik, Commentary Magazine

More Perspectives on Iran's Elections

2009-06-17T11:45:00.000-07:00

"Big, big news from Iran right now, incredible, three days of riots, street fighting, people setting fire to everything. I'm not sure who won over there: Ahmadinejad or the Lakers.... President Ahmadinejad is claiming that he won, causing a lot of controversy. Some people say that Ahmadinejad cheated a little bit. They're now that saying weeks before the election President Ahmadinejad distributed 400,000 tons of potatoes to voters in rural areas. Who knew he'd be put over the top by the Iranian-Irish vote?"

--Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

"[Iran's] election returns are kind of hard to believe. According to the numbers, both opposition candidates lost to Ahmadinejad in their hometowns. That's like Barack Obama losing in the city of Chicago. I'm not, in any way, suggesting Iranian politics are as corrupt as Chicago, but even Blagojevich is like, 'Oh, they're good!'"

--Craig Ferguson, The Late Late Show

"Well, the results from Iran's presidential elections are in. And Mahmoud Ahmadinejad has declared victory. But his opponent, Mir-Hossein Mousavi, is claiming ballot fraud and wants an investigation. If that doesn't work, he's planning on making a documentary about global warming."

--Jimmy Fallon, Late Night

The Delusional President

2009-06-17T11:36:00.000-07:00

"President Obama spoke to the American Medical Association convention in Chicago Monday. He insisted to the doctors that his health care plan would provide coverage for everyone without increasing the deficit or reducing the quality of care. After the speech a raucous debate broke out over whether to prescribe thorazine or lithium..."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

Iranian Elections

2009-06-16T07:29:00.000-07:00

"The country of Iran is holding its presidential election with four candidates running. Iranians [had] to decide which candidate is best prepared to lead them into the 12th century."

-- Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

Must Be Love

2009-06-15T06:33:00.000-07:00

"[Last week] President Barack Obama met the king of Saudi Arabia, who kissed Obama twice. Obama says he hasn't gotten this kind of treatment since he met Keith Olbermann."

--Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

Selling Bonds to China

2009-06-14T12:25:00.000-07:00

"Republicans on Capitol Hill warned Thursday that President Obama's government health care ambitions will run the country into the ground financially. If we run the country any further into the ground a lot of bond salesmen are going to lose their jobs. We'll be close enough to China where we can just push them up through the dirt."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

Shalom, Amigos!

2009-06-13T12:09:00.000-07:00

"President Obama gave a big historic speech [last week] in Egypt. President Obama impressed listeners by beginning his speech with the traditional Islamic greeting, 'Salaam Aleikum.' Yes, it's very cool. Yes it was especially impressive because a year ago, President Bush opened with 'Shalom, Amigos!'"

--Conan O'Brien, The Tonight Show

What Obama Isn't Telling You

2009-06-12T09:39:00.000-07:00

"The crucial question about Obama's agenda has always been whether it really will slow the disastrous rise in health-care spending, or actually increase it while hiding the real costs of the new system.

"On analyzing the bills, the conclusion is inescapable: Obama promises Americans what appears to be a bargain by heavily subsidizing their premiums. But the only way to pay for what's really outrageously expensive coverage will be huge tax increases, especially on the same middle class that's being wooed as the chief beneficiary of reform. . . . The demand for everything from knee surgery to mental health counseling will soar. But the government will keep a lid on prices, so Americans, for the first time, will be faced with rationing. The hospitals and physicians simply won't be able to satisfy the unhinged demand for the services that look like a bargain.

"The lines will grow. And so will the spending, and the taxes. And that's what Obama isn't telling you."

-- Shawn Tully, Senior Editor-at-Large, Fortune Magazine

3-Name Axis List

2009-06-12T09:18:00.000-07:00

"The White House threatened to put North Korea back on the list of terrorist nations Tuesday. The list always has three names on it. Under Republicans the Axis of Evil was North Korea, Iran and Iraq, and under Democrats it's North Korea, I Own and I Earn."

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

Obamacare

2009-06-10T16:30:00.000-07:00

"Judge Sonia Sotomayor fractured her ankle at the airport Monday but she went to the White House before getting it treated. It wasn't necessary. You don't need the president's okay for a doctor's appointment until the health care bill actually passes!"

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

Great Communicators

2009-06-09T09:41:00.000-07:00

"The great difference between Reagan's rhetorical skills and President Obama's rhetorical skills is that Reagan used his rhetorical skills to shine light on truths and facts, while Obama uses his rhetorical skills to hide."

-- Former U.S. Speaker of the House of Representatives Newt Gingrinch

"The Utility of Wealth is Fairly Low if You're Dead"

2009-06-08T18:37:00.000-07:00

"A far better alternative [to Obama's plan to nationalize health care] is to increase individual responsibility for medical decisions... When people aren't exposed to the true cost of their care -- though it is paid in foregone wages and higher taxes for public programs -- they consume more care... Increasing cost-sharing would discipline the health spending curve [by making prices explicit for consumers]...

"...Yet the entire Obama agenda is about increasing political, rather than individual, control of the health markets. [In a world of government-funded health care], all costs will climb even higher as people use far more 'free' care and federal spending will reach epic levels. Bureaucrats watching the bottom line will try to ration care while simultaneously locked in a death match with interest groups guarding their turf. Congress will join the fray and make things worse, as it always does. Caught in the political crossfire will be patients, as they always are.

"None of the complexities...would matter as much if the Obama Administration were merely trying to defossilize Medicare and save the federal fisc. But instead it is exploiting the looming bankruptcy of our current entitlements as a pretext to pass the largest entitlement expansion since 1965. And it is selling this agenda with a phony cost-control 'plan' that doesn't even exist."

-- Wall Street Journal

The Politics of Race

2009-06-08T13:48:00.000-07:00

"Judge Sotomayor is the archetypal 'challenger.' Challengers see the moral authority that comes from their group's historic grievance as an entitlement to immediate parity with whites -- whether or not their group has actually earned this parity through development. If their group is not yet competitive with whites, the moral authority that comes from their grievance should be allowed to compensate for what they lack in development. This creates a terrible corruption in which the group's historic grievance is allowed to count as individual merit. And so a perverse incentive is created: Weakness and victimization are rewarded over development....

"Sonia Sotomayor is of the generation of minorities that came of age under the hegemony of this perverse incentive. For this generation, challenging and protesting were careerism itself. This is why middle- and upper middle-class minorities are often more militant than poor and working-class minorities. America's institutions -- universities, government agencies, the media and even corporations -- reward their grievance....

"With the Sotomayor nomination, Mr. Obama has made the same mistake his wife made in her 'This is the first time I am proud of my country' remark: bad faith toward an America that has shown him only good faith."

-- Shelby Steele, Stanford University

The Lighter Side

2009-06-06T12:36:00.000-07:00

"Sonia Sotomayor met with Senate Republicans Tuesday. They said she's a delight but they don't know if they'll vote for her -- they don't have the richness of her experience as a wise Latina woman, so they make decisions by examining all the evidence!"

-- Argus Hamilton, The Comedy Store

She Said, She Said

2009-06-05T11:21:00.000-07:00

"President Obama told NBC News last week that he was sure Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor 'would have restated' her controversial 2001 law review article in which she suggested 'a wise Latina woman' should 'reach a better conclusion than a white male' judge.

"If so, it would involve a lot of restating. It turns out Ms. Sotomayor used the reference in multiple forums between 1994 and 2003. According to her response to questions from the Senate Judiciary Committee, in an October 2003 speech at Seton Hall University she stated, 'I would hope that a wise Latina woman with the richness of her experiences would, more often than not, reach a better conclusion.' The words are nearly identical to her 2001 remarks at the University of California, Berkeley that she later approved for publication in a law review.

"On numerous other occasions, Judge Sotomayor gave speeches repeating the formulation. Several speeches in Puerto Rico in 1994 and addresses at Yale and the City University of New York also included similar statements.

"The Obama administration insists Ms. Sotomayor is no exponent of identity politics and the judge has been generally getting good reviews in her one-on-one visits with Senators. But Republicans tell me she appears eager to rush through her talking points about her commitment to abide by the rule of law. 'She trips over herself in repeating the same stock phrases she must know Republicans like to hear,' one Senate source told me. 'But she got flustered when asked a specific question about a notable Supreme Court opinion, and had to say she'd get back to us.'

"For his part, Senator John Cornyn of Texas, a member of the Judiciary Committee, told reporters after his private meeting with Ms. Sotomayor that he had new concerns about whether she is wedded to 'identity politics.'"

-- John Fund, Wall Street Journal

A Brilliant Leader in Washington D.C.

2009-06-05T11:16:00.000-07:00

"I understand that during her career, she's written hundreds and hundreds of opinions. I haven't read a single one of them, and if I'm fortunate before we end this, I won't have to read one of them."

-- Senate Democratic Leader Harry Reid, speaking to reporters about Obama's Supreme Court nominee Sonia Sotomayor

Identity Politics

2009-05-27T10:14:00.000-07:00

"Imagine a judicial nominee said 'My experience as a white man makes me better than a latina woman.' Wouldn't they have to withdraw? New racism is no better than old racism."

-- Former U.S. Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich

Dallas Fed on Untrammelled U.S. Borrowing

2009-05-26T19:03:00.000-07:00

"Throughout history, what the political class has done is they have turned to the central bank to print their way out of an unfunded liability. We can't let that happen. That's when you open the floodgates.... You can't run away from it.... I am a big believer in [Schumpeter's] 'creative destruction.' The 'destructive' part is always painful, politically messy, it hurts like hell but you hopefully will allow the adjustments to be made so that the 'creative' part can take place."

-- Dallas Fed President Richard Fisher, in last week's Wall Street Journal

Defeatism was Just Campaign Politics

2009-05-22T10:07:00.000-07:00

"We are now in the age of a sober and judicious President Obama who circumspectly, if reluctantly and in anguish at the high cost, does what is necessary to keep us safe. And we won't see [any] brave young liberal senator, Obama-like, barnstorming the Iowa precincts blasting a presidency for trampling our values with the shame of Guantanamo, wiretaps, intercepts, renditions, military tribunals, Predators, Iraq, etc. That motif just dissolved -- or rather, it never really existed. It short, all the fury, the vicious slander, the self-righteous outbursts, the impassioned speeches from the floor, the 'I accuse' op-eds by the usual moralistic pundits -- all that turned out to be solely about politics, nothing more."

-- Stanford's Hoover Institution scholar Victor Davis Hanson, on the Obama administration's belated agreement with Bush policies on nearly every aspect of national security

Non Investment Grade America

2009-05-22T10:00:00.000-07:00

"Giving the keynote address at Washington's St. Regis Hotel [this week, House Majority Leader Democrat Steny Hoyer] lamented: 'For years, our government has lived far beyond its means -- and we see now that when we over-rely on debt, things can turn very ugly, very quickly.' He warned darkly: 'If a fiscal meltdown comes, there will be no one to bail out America.' Of course, that didn't stop Mr. Hoyer from voting for President Obama's $800 billion stimulus bill and a new budget that runs up the debt by $9 trillion over ten years....

"All of this comes, by the way, when the Medicare and Social Security Trustees warn that the long-term unfunded liabilities of the government's entitlement programs have reached $62.9 trillion and are growing fast.... Moody's and S&P are talking about taking away the U.S. government's Triple-A credit rating. What is Congress's response as the Titanic heads toward the iceberg? Democrats apparently believe the time is ripe to pass a $1 trillion universal health care entitlement.

"The new Obama budget doubles the debt as a share of GDP in ten years. The president claims with a straight face that high on his agenda list, after his vast spending plans, is hosting a 'fiscal responsibility' summit. Good one. 'Politicians only care about the deficit when they think the time is right to raise taxes,' says [Dan] Mitchell, economist at the Cato Institute. Borrow-and-spend or tax-and-spend -- pick your poison. Both are good ways to wreck an economy and blight American living standards for a generation."

-- Stephen Moore and Tyler Grimm, Wall Street Journal

Obama's A Genius!

2009-05-20T11:53:00.000-07:00

"President Obama's decision to increase fuel efficiency standards (CAFE) to 35.5 mpg for cars and light trucks by 2016 is trumpeted as a victory for consumers and the environment. But if car buyers are so thrilled, why would the government have to mandate higher-mileage cars in the first place?

"As even the Obama administration concedes, higher CAFE standards will mean a higher sticker prices (about $1,200 per car), which will work against the goal of bringing newer, more efficient cars to the road. Professor Robert N. Stavins, director of the Harvard Environmental Economics Program, explains: 'CAFE increases the price of new cars, and thereby keeps existing cars on the road longer. The existing cars are dirtier and less fuel-efficient. This counterproductive effect is typical of any vintage-differentiated-regulation.'

"On balance, when forced to buy higher mileage cars, the record also shows that the public adapts by driving more miles rather than walk or simply not taking a given trip. Since CAFE was established 34 years ago, the number of miles driven by the average car has risen 50% -- even as the number of cars owned by Americans has also grown faster than the population. No wonder CAFE is associated with little or no real impact on gasoline usage.

"A bigger problem is that more stringent CAFE standards make cars less safe to drive and increase road deaths. 'CAFE is among the deadliest government regulations we have,' says Competitive Enterprise Institute General Counsel Sam Kazman. He adds the morbid detail that raising fuel efficiency standards 'kills consumers by reducing vehicle size, and now it may well kill car companies by forcing them to produce cars that consumers don't want.' One 2002 study by the National Research Council shows that CAFE in the past has added roughly 2,000 road deaths per year.

"What might seem inexplicable is that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, an agency supposedly in the business of reducing auto fatalities, is fully on-board with the Obama small-car agenda. Actually it's not so inexplicable: Chuck Hurley, most recently the head of Mothers Against Drunk Driving, abruptly withdrew his nomination to head NHTSA last week under pressure from environmentalists. His crime was having made statements in the past acknowledging CAFE's impact in increasing traffic deaths."

-- Stephen Moore, Wall Street Journal

Voters to CA Legislature: Drop Dead

2009-05-20T11:42:00.000-07:00

"California voters couldn't have delivered a more emphatic message to the state's political establishment yesterday. In a special statewide election, voters rejected five of the six ballot measures passed by the legislature to extend recently passed tax increases and create various budget gimmicks to reduce the state's deficit. The only measure to pass was a sop to public anger, one that would block pay raises for legislators if they fail to pass a balanced budget.

"Almost all of the state's major leaders, including Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, practically begged voters to approve the measures. A coalition of teachers, infrastructure enthusiasts and business groups raised nearly $26 million to warn Californians of the dire consequences if the propositions failed. Opponents raised only $4.3 million, but nonetheless secured a greater than 60% "no" vote on each of the five defeated measures.

"It's unlikely state legislators will go back to the people with any new, bright ideas. Yesterday's election was the 13th time since 2000 that Californians have been asked to vote on statewide referendums, and voter fatigue has clearly set in. 'Voters have spoken and taken tax increases off the table,' says Jon Fleischman, editor of the influential political blog FlashReport.org.

"California now must either scale back its bloated array of state government programs or seek a federal bailout. Some relief from Washington is possible in the form of a federal guarantee on the state's short-term debt, allowing the state to roll over its debt and pay incoming bills when it runs out of cash this summer. But that Band-Aid will do nothing to address the state's massive deficit, which is likely to reach 25% of the total budget this year."

-- John Fund, Wall Street Journal

There's a Reason for the Tea Parties

2009-05-19T10:27:00.000-07:00

"[When] Congress and the president make plans to increase the federal debt by one-third in just the administration's first 100 days, citizens and taxpayers should be worried. When federal stimulus bills force state governments to change long-standing laws, raise taxes and increase government spending, citizens and taxpayers should be outraged. The swollen river known as the federal government has clearly overflowed its banks."

-- Texas Gov. Rick Perry, in the Austin Statesman-American

Cheap Shots

2009-05-15T12:58:00.000-07:00

"Von Mises, Hayek, Schumpeter, Nozick and others have noted that under democratic capitalism there are always influential intellectuals who condemn capitalism and call for the state to restrain the markets. Such an activity bears no risk and may be very rewarding. (This contrasts strongly with the consequences of criticizing socialism while living under socialism.) Entrepreneurial capitalism has nowadays no serious external enemies; it can only be weakened from within."

-- Leszek Balcerowicz, former governor of the National Bank of Poland, on the folly of blaming 'capitalism,' rather than specific policy failures, for the subprime bubble and its aftermath

Is It Us? Or Him?

2009-05-14T10:23:00.000-07:00

"The President is attempting to claim credit for [health care] savings that (a) do not yet exist, (b) are not backed up by any specific changes in industry practices or government policies, and (c) are related to him only in that the groups announced they were adopting his quantitative goal. For all three of these reasons, the President's claim that these savings will materialize is wildly unrealistic, and it is absurd to attach a per-family savings number to it. This is like the Mayor claiming credit for the 40 additional wins now, and telling fans that he will be responsible for the team winning the pennant. No one should take these claims seriously."

-- Economist Keith Hennessey, on President Obama's announcement that he had partnered with health care companies to find $2 trillion in medical savings over the next decade

NYT Reporter on Palin & the MSM

2009-05-13T11:12:00.000-07:00

"[National journalists] write off that whole wing of the Republican Party. I don't think they understand the appeal of culture conservatism. It's too foreign and outside their experience."

-- Melinda Henneberger, former New York Times reporter, speaking to Jon Friedman of MarketWatch about the inability of the national media to understand Gov. Sarah Palin's appeal

Banana Republic of California

2009-05-12T09:48:00.000-07:00

"'California may have to go into bankruptcy,' Rep. Brad Sherman told me at a brunch in Washington this past Sunday. The California Democrat, who represents the wealthy Los Angeles suburbs, is no hysteric -- he's a certified public accountant and former chair of the State Board of Equalization, which administers California's sales tax system. 'It would be unprecedented,' he said. 'A judge may have to step in if and when the state can't pay its bonds.'

"The scenario is becoming more likely as tax revenues have declined so sharply that California now faces a budget deficit of some $15 billion by June. If six budget measures on next Tuesday's ballot fail, blocking extension of certain "temporary" tax hikes and preventing the state from selling future lottery revenue, the state's red ink may hit $21 billion. In a last ditch effort to save the ballot measures, which are trailing badly in the polls, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger has announced he's preparing a 'doomsday' budget with massive spending cuts in case the propositions fail.

"One reason the ballot measures look like losers is that California voters swallowed harsh medicine only three months ago in February when the legislature passed a series of tax hikes to stem the budget shortfall. Those tax hikes in the middle of a recession have only exacerbated the state's unfriendly business climate. So far, California legislators have avoided making fundamental budget reforms. The spending cap they placed on next week's ballot is riddled with loopholes and would only go into effect if voters approve extending the February tax increases. 'It's the equivalent of holding a gun to voters' heads,' says Rep. Tom McClintock, a Republican from Sacramento. 'Voters may not know the details, but they feel the politicians have abdicated their responsibility to clean up the mess.'

"Those same politicians will now look to Washington for a solution rather than address the problems squarely if the ballot measures lose. Rep. Sherman says state officials will ask the federal government to guarantee the state's short-term debt in order to keep checks flowing to creditors. He points out that California faces limits on how deeply it can cut social programs, such as education or health care for the poor, without jeopardizing federal stimulus funding. Just last week, the Obama administration informed Governor Schwarzenegger that his proposed wage cuts for home health-care workers would cost the state billions of dollars in stimulus funds. Governor Schwarzenegger's office complains that the powerful Service Employees International Union, which lobbied the Obama administration to withhold stimulus funds if the state went ahead with pay cuts, was included in a conference call in which state and federal officials discussed Washington's ultimatum.

"Kim Belshe, California's Secretary of Health and Human Services, told the Los Angeles Times she was surprised the union was allowed to participate in government-to-government negotiations. 'The involvement of a stakeholder in this kind of state-federal deliberative process is unusual at best. This was really atypical and outside any norm I am familiar with,' she said.

"Ms. Belshe may have to get used to the new norm. The powerful public sector unions that run California would rather lobby for a federal bailout than tolerate any repeal of the tax hikes that are driving people and businesses from the state. Unless the state's elected leadership finds a way to break this stranglehold, California['s state government] may face a death spiral in which an unelected bankruptcy judge will ultimately control the state's destiny."

-- John Fund, Wall Street Journal

The Sack of Chrysler

2009-05-12T09:45:00.000-07:00

"It is absolutely critical to follow [established, legal] priority rules inside bankruptcy in order to allow creditors to price risk outside of bankruptcy. Upsetting this fixed hierarchy among creditors is just an illegal taking of property from one group of creditors for the benefit of another, which should be struck down on both statutory and constitutional grounds.

"In a just world, that ignominious fate would await the flawed Chrysler reorganization, which violates these well-established norms, given the nonstop political interference of the Obama administration, which put its muscle behind the beleaguered United Auto Workers. Its onerous collective bargaining agreements are off-limits to the reorganization provisions, thereby preserving the current labor rigidities in a down market."

-- University of Chicago constitutional scholar Richard Epstein, on the Obama administration's misuse of the bankruptcy process to give a 55% stake in Chrysler to the UAW

Bought & Paid For

2009-05-08T12:54:00.000-07:00

"We are hardly [Zimbabwe or Venezuela]. But if we keep using TARP to create a sort of 'Most Favored Borrower' status, we'll erode the safeguards that keep election to office in America from being the kind of giant spoils system that's common in much of the world. . . . [In the Chrysler bankruptcy, the Obama administration] got its pet majority stakeholders to screw both their own shareholders, and the other creditors, in order to give a powerful union a sweetheart deal . . . When the government gives money to favored constituencies -- well, I don't like it, but as PJ O'Rourke says, that's basically what our government does. 'It ought to be right there in the constitution: We the People, in order to form a more perfect union, establish justice, insure domestic tranquility, provide for the common defense, promote the general welfare, and give money to jerks. . . . ' But when it starts stepping in and trying to bypass the bankruptcy rules in order to make someone else give money to jerks, that's different in magnitude, and in kind."

-- Megan McArdle, writing at TheAtlantic.com on the Obama Administration's manipulation of the Chrysler bankruptcy to benefit the UAW

From James Madison

2009-05-07T09:51:00.000-07:00

"If Congress can do whatever in their discretion can be done by money, and will promote the General Welfare, the Government is no longer a limited one, possessing enumerated powers, but an indefinite one...."

-- James Madison, letter to Edmund Pendleton, January 21, 1792

A Green Sees Red

2009-05-07T09:41:00.000-07:00

"Al Gore's favorite prognosticator [NASA scientist James Hansen], the direst voice in the climate-change movement, hasn't recanted. Rather, in his latest manifesto, released yesterday, Mr. Hansen excoriates House baron Henry Waxman's 648-page cap-and-trade bill: He calls it 'feckless,' 'this monstrous absurdity,' 'a disastrous approach' and 'the temple of doom' at which politicians 'worship.'

"Mr. Hansen may not have a gift for subtlety, but he does for candor. His favored approach to carbon reduction is a straight tax, with 100% of the revenue rebated to consumers. That would still be an extremely expensive and likely futile remedy for a speculative problem -- Mr. Hansen would only agree with the first part, of course -- but it would also be the cleanest, most transparent approach.

"'648 pages,' Mr. Hansen writes, 'are not needed to define a carbon fee.' He argues that cap-and-trade markets are so complex because politicians 'want the process mystified,' the easier to dispense green pork to politically popular constituencies. It 'probably has something to do with all the alligator shoes in Washington,' he adds, a reference to the Beltway's 2,400 energy lobbyists.

"Mr. Obama himself has begun personally to twist arms on Mr. Waxman's committee, trying to quell an uprising among rural and moderate Democrats against cap-and-trade. The rebellious ones wouldn't like Mr. Hansen's approach any better, of course. But at least he's not selling the snake oil that 'industry' can be made to bear all the costs. To have any impact at all on emissions, he says frankly, 'the carbon price must be sufficient to affect lifestyle choices.'"

-- Joseph Rago, Wall Street Journal

Thomas Jefferson on Government

2009-05-06T07:30:00.000-07:00

“Experience hath shewn that even under the best forms [of government] those entrusted with power have, in time…perverted it into tyranny.”

-- Thomas Jefferson, 1779

The Sage of Obama, I Mean Omaha

2009-05-05T10:59:00.000-07:00

"Get the feeling Warren Buffett doesn't care much for the administration's bank plan?

"At last weekend's annual Berkshire jamboree in Omaha, he was dismissive of its signature effort to bolster confidence. 'I apply my own stress test,' he said of Wells Fargo, a bank he owns a large stake in. Naturally, it came through with flying colors, never mind the cloud over its stock thanks to reports that the Obama administration will demand a stiff capital raising, diluting Mr. Buffett's stake.

"Piped in Charlie Munger, Mr. Buffett's vice chairman and long-time partner: Team Obama's 'bank stress test is very likely to be done poorly. Maybe the whole idea was not such a good idea.'

"Ouch. The administration would be in a better position to slap down its sometime 'adviser' if market confidence clearly depended on big cushions of bank capital right now. In a systemic crisis, however, no amount of capital is enough -- and, at the same time, no amount of capital is necessary if the government has put its own ability to print money behind the banking system's liabilities.

"That's where we are today. Mr. Buffett didn't touch on the playing-with-a-match aspect of Tim Geithner's stress tests -- the danger that he would identify capital holes that neither private investors nor a surly congress would be willing to fill, undermining today’s hard-won confidence. Nonetheless the sage of Omaha, who seldom discusses his specific stock holdings, made an exception of Wells Fargo for a reason: He obviously was sending a message to the Obama administration that the possible dilution of shareholders in banks that 'fail' the tests may do more harm than good if it scares away bank investors, who have the potential to supply all the capital banks need in the long run if they believe banks will be allowed to report profits and share them with investors.

"Mr. Buffett says he continues to support Mr. Obama, his candidate in last year's election. He acknowledged on CNBC yesterday, though, that his interaction with the president since he took office has consisted mostly of waving to him from a distance at public functions."

-- Holman W. Jenkins Jr., Wall Street Journal

From Sam Adams

2009-05-05T10:28:00.000-07:00

"It does not take a majority to prevail...but rather an irate, tireless minority, keen on setting brush fires of freedom in the minds of men."

-- Samuel Adams

Welcome to the Rule of Man

2009-05-01T11:29:00.000-07:00

"In the Chrysler deal, the [United Auto Workers] were unsecured creditors and the Chrysler bondholders were secured creditors. The bondholders received 28% of the value of their $6.9 billion in bonds in cash; the Union will receive stock worth approximately $4.2 billion, and a note for an additional $4.58 billion, which represents 82% of the value of their claim. Either the government negotiators have dyslexia and have made a terrible mistake in their paperwork, or this is political payoff writ large.... And thus we enter a brazen new era of government, when the White House is openly complicit in the theft of, as a matter of fact is directing, the looting of private property from investors. Welcome to the Rule of Man, or as the President calls it, 'Change we can believe in!'"

-- Dave Cribbin, TailWind Capital Group

Kim Strassel on Rebuilding the GOP

2009-05-01T09:07:00.000-07:00

"[Republican party-building will require] members explaining to younger constituents why old-fashioned principles of choice and freedom still work for modern problems like health care. It means transmitting a welcome to those attracted to even one part of the conservative philosophy -- free markets, strong national security, social values -- even if not all."

-- Kim Strassel, Wall Street Journal

Jim Rogers on Washington's Bailout Frenzy

2009-04-29T10:49:00.001-07:00

"The idea that you can solve a problem of too much debt and too much consumption with more debt and more consumption is ludicrous on its face.... The Japanese tried this approach of propping up zombie banks and zombie companies; it did not work. And it's not going to work in America either."

-- Jim Rogers, interview with Time magazine

Newt Gingrich on Obama's First 100 Days

2009-04-29T10:02:00.000-07:00

President Obama’s first 100 days have been spectacularly successful. President Obama is the strongest domestic Democratic President since Lyndon Johnson. His ability to get Democrats in Congress to give him things that undermine their own power is impressive. In just 100 days, President Obama has been devastatingly effective in moving forward swiftly the most radical, government-expanding agenda in American history.

A European Model of Government Control

At home, in everything from his economic policy to his energy policy to his just-announced science policy, President Obama has successfully moved the country from a traditional American model of entrepreneurship and private initiative to a European model of regulation and government control. Abroad, he has succeeded in his apparent goal to be the un-George W. Bush; replacing aggressive, if sometimes flawed, American leadership with a humbled, weakened America on the world stage. Judged by these standards, President Obama’s first 100 days have been a remarkable success.

Dominating Congress

The Obama record in the first 100 days includes three instances of spectacular political impunity:

• Under the guise of “economic stimulus” he was able to pass a $787 billion gift for his liberal special interest base. And he did it so quickly that no member of Congress was able to read it before they voted.
• After campaigning on a pledge to end earmarks, he signed an appropriations bill loaded with 8,000 earmarks -- and paid no political penalty.
• President Obama has kept congressional Democrats marching with him in lockstep. House Democrats tow the party line an amazing 94 percent of the time and Senate Democrats vote Democratic 91 percent of the time.

Historic Bureaucratic Power Grabs

In these first 100 days, the Obama Administration has achieved two historic bureaucratic power grabs:
• President Obama has transformed the Federal Reserve and the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation (FDIC) into giant engines of unsupervised spending. Together, they’ve spent the equivalent of the entire federal budget for 2007, without having to disclose where the money went.
• Just two weeks ago, the President presided over an unprecedented bureaucratic power grab when his Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) ruled that greenhouse gases pose a threat to public health. This seemingly innocuous decision opens the door to wholesale regulation of American life by government. The threat is so great that politicians and activists are using the specter of an out-of-control EPA to force Congress to pass a $1 trillion to $2 trillion energy tax in the form of cap-and-trade legislation.

Foreign Policy Weakness

The Obama 100 days record also includes remarkable weakness and self-delusion overseas:
• In an attempt to overcome anti-Americanism abroad by agreeing with it, President Obama has gone on a global apology tour, labeling America as “arrogant, dismissive and derisive” in front of foreign audiences.
• President Obama has unleashed a domestic war over the meaning of guilt by caving in to the anti-American left and leaving the door open to prosecuting Bush Administration officials over the interrogation of terrorists who plotted to kill Americans.

All Just a Prelude to His $3.5 Trillion Budget

But all these successful expansions of government at home and retractions of American leadership abroad are merely a prelude to President Obama’s looming crowning achievement: His 2010 budget which remakes our health care system, remakes our energy system, raises taxes and forecasts an amazing $9 trillion increase in the national debt.

As I write this, Democrats in Congress are fashioning a deal to pass the budget’s provisions on health care by preventing Republicans and moderate Democrats from having a voice in the debate. Think about that. The Obama-Reid-Pelosi political machine is going to pass legislation that fundamentally affects every single American -- as well as 17 percent of our economy -- by cutting the elected representatives of half of all Americans out of the process. If they succeed, the budget will be President Obama’s most enduring -- and devastating -- accomplishment.

Change We Can Believe In? Or Change in What we Believe?

One thing is clear at this point in President Obama’s presidency: His control of Washington Democrats has been so masterful, and his policies so successful, that he has officially claimed ownership of the American economy. Going forward, it won’t be possible to continue to place blame on former President Bush and the Republicans. If President Obama fails, it will be his failure and his alone. As for us, the “success” of the first 100 days of the Obama presidency raises a threatening possibility. As my daughter and columnist Jackie Cushman put it, if we’re not careful, instead of change we can believe in, we’re going to have change in what we believe. It’s something to ponder for the next 1,361 days.

Dick Morris on the New Bride

2009-04-29T08:18:00.001-07:00

"...The most recent Rasmussen Poll asked voters if they wanted an economic system of complete free enterprise or preferred more government involvement in managing the economy. By 77-19, they voted against a government role, up seven points from last month. And in the Fox News poll -- the very same survey that gave Obama a 62 percent approval rating and reported that 68 percent of voters are 'satisfied' with his first hundred days -- voters, by 50-38, supported a smaller government that offered fewer services over a larger government that provided more. By 42-8, the Fox News poll (conducted on April 22-23) found that voters felt Obama had expanded government rather than contracted it (42 percent said it was the same size) and, by 46-30, reported believing that big government was more of a danger to the nation than big business. (By 50-23, they said Obama felt big business was more dangerous.) By 62-20, they said government spending, under Obama, was 'out of control.'

"So if voters differ so fundamentally with the president on the very essence of his program, why do they accord him high ratings? They are like the recently married bride who took her vows 100 days ago. It would be a disaster for her life if she decides that she really doesn't like her husband. But she keeps noticing things about him that she can't stand. It will be a while before she walks out the door or even comes to terms with her own doubts, but it is probably inevitable that she will.

"For Americans to conclude that they disapprove of their president in the midst of an earth-shaking crisis is very difficult. But as Obama's daily line moves from 'I inherited this mess' to 'There are faint signs of light,' the clock starts ticking. If there is no recovery for the next six months -- and I don't think there will be -- Obama will inevitably become part of the problem, not part of the solution. And then will come his heavy lifting. He has yet to raise taxes, regiment healthcare or provide amnesty for illegal immigrants. He hasn't closed down the car companies he now runs and he has not yet forced a 50 percent hike in utility bills with his cap-and-trade legislation. These are all the goodies he has in store for us all. Obama's very activism these days arrogates to himself the blame for the success or failure of his policies. Their outcome will determine his outcome, and there is no way it will be positive. Why?

• "You can't borrow as much as he will need to without raising interest rates that hurt the economy
• "The massive amount of spending will trigger runaway inflation once the economy starts to recover
• "His overhaul of the tax code (still in the planning phases) and his intervention in corporate management will create such business uncertainty that nobody will invest in anything until they see the lay of the land
• "His bank program is designed to help banks, but not to catalyze consumer lending. And his proposal for securitization of consumer loans won't work and is just what got us into this situation.

"So Mr. Obama should enjoy his poll numbers while he may."

Observation from Jack Abramoff

2009-04-28T10:40:00.000-07:00

"More money available from government is blood in the water for sharks."

-- Jack Abramoff, lobbyist, convicted felon, shark

Huber on Emissions & Fossil Fuel Economics

2009-04-27T12:17:00.000-07:00

"We [Americans & Europeans] can't stop the world's 5 billion poor people from burning the couple of trillion tons of cheap carbon that they have within easy reach. . . . If $40 trillion worth of gold were located where most of the oil is, one could only scoff at any suggestion that we might somehow persuade the nasty people to leave the wealth buried. . . .

"So the suggestion that we can lift ourselves out of the economic doldrums by spending lavishly on exceptionally expensive new sources of energy is absurd. 'Green jobs' means Americans paying other Americans to chase carbon while the rest of the world builds new power plants and factories. And the environmental consequences of outsourcing jobs, industries, and carbon to developing countries are beyond dispute. They use energy far less efficiently than we do, and they remain almost completely oblivious to environmental impacts, just as we were in our own first century of industrialization. A massive transfer of carbon, industry, and jobs from us to them will raise carbon emissions, not lower them."

-- Peter Huber, Manhattan Institute City Journal

The Luddites Are Back

2009-04-24T10:43:00.000-07:00

"What's worse than the EPA grabbing power over CO2? Well, leading Luddite and Congressman Henry Waxman is worse. His proposal sets carbon reduction goals of 20 percent by 2020, 42 percent by 2030 and 83 percent by 2050, and, with cap-and-trade, effectively nationalizes energy production. This incremental destruction of prosperity is probably going to have to be modified as soon as citizens get a taste of reality. But how could any reasonable or responsible legislator suggest an 83 percent cut in emissions without any practical or wide-scale alternative to replace it, or any plan to pay for it all? When people are on a crusade, I guess, logic rarely plays a part."

-- David Harsanyi, Denver Post

Lady In Green

2009-04-23T10:42:00.000-07:00

"[Obama's EPA Chief Lisa Jackson's landmark 'Endangerment Finding' on global warming 'pollution'] sets the ball rolling toward an incalculable new EPA effort to regulate energy consumption in the U.S. Yet one searches her lengthy finding and its associated Technical Support Document in vain for the specific evidence that CO2 is causing climate change. It cites the standard estimate that global average temperatures have increased about a 1.4 degrees (F) in the last century. It says, 'Eight of the ten warmest years on record have occurred since 2001' [yet] fails to note that there's been no net warming in the past decade....

"Most importantly, on the critical question of whether the observed warming is human-caused or natural, EPA offers only a consensus of unspecified computer models. It doesn't even say which computer model it finds most convincing and why. Dangerous warming in these models doesn't come directly from C02 -- it comes ultimately from various theorized 'positive feedbacks,' such as a wetter atmosphere, reduced snow reflection, changes in clouds, etc, etc. Warming, whatever its initial impetus, begets more warming -- so the theory goes. But these feedbacks aren't well understood, well measured or even cataloged (the problem of clouds is particularly sticky) -- and yet they provide the tiny net push toward accelerating warming in computer simulations to justify Al Gore-like climate fears. All this, by the way, despite the rough-and-ready intuition that negative feedbacks must prevail over time, since the biosphere didn't burn up long ago.

"No Nobel Prizes have been awarded for the science of global warming for good reason, but one has been awarded for the study of 'availability bias' -- the idea that abstract beliefs are held widely not because of their truth, but because of their social utility. Ms. Jackson obviously has no trouble rejecting nuclear power while embracing global warming, since both served the utility of making her acceptable as EPA chief in a Democratic administration. Her 'Endangerment Finding' is a scientific landmark all right. When scientists get around to a post-mortem on their role in the global warming hysteria, losing sight of the fundamental concept of 'evidence' will be the heart of their self-indictment."

-- Holman W. Jenkins Jr., Wall Street Journal

Khalil Gibran on Popular Wisdom

2009-04-22T23:14:00.000-07:00

"Once there ruled in the distant city of Wirani a king who was both mighty and wise. And he was feared for his might and loved for his wisdom.

"Now, in the heart of that city was a well, whose water was cool and crystalline, from which all the inhabitants drank, even the king and his courtiers; for there was no other well.

"One night when all were asleep, a witch entered the city, and poured seven drops of strange liquid into the well, and said, 'From this hour he who drinks this water shall become mad.' Next morning all the inhabitants, save the king and his lord chamberlain, drank from the well and became mad, even as the witch had foretold. And during that day the people in the narrow streets and in the market places did naught but whisper to one another, 'The king is mad. Our king and his lord chamberlain have lost their reason. Surely we cannot be ruled by a mad king. We must dethrone him.'

"That evening the king ordered a golden goblet to be filled from the well. And when it was brought to him he drank deeply, and gave it to his lord chamberlain to drink. And there was great rejoicing in that distant city of Wirani, because its king and its lord chamberlain had regained their reason."

-- Khalil Gibran, The Madman (1918)

Son of A Japanese Preacher Man

2009-04-22T11:54:00.000-07:00

"Knees went rubbery when President Obama delivered his economic speech last week at Georgetown, chastising American business more in sorrow than anger for its pursuit of 'excessive debt,' 'reckless speculation' and 'fleeting profits.' He blamed America's housing bubble and subprime meltdown on a 'perfect storm of irresponsibility.'

"Writing in the New York Times, David Brooks positively dripped that 'Obama is arguing for his activist agenda not on the basis of class-consciousness, which is alien to America, but as a defense of middle-class morality, which is central to it.'

"What should really strike Mr. Obama's listeners, however, is the president's unconscious cribbing from Yasushi Mieno, the Japanese central banker who popped Japan's property and stock market bubble of the late 1980s, ushering in the 'lost decade' that followed. The echoes are uncanny. Mr. Mieno decried an era of greed and corner-cutting and financial engineering, in words almost identical to Mr. Obama's. 'The bubble hurt the soundness and stability of Japanese society,' he said at the time. 'The efforts of labor, which is to work with sweat on your forehead, have been weakened. Morale was reduced and there was unfairness in the distribution of wealth.'

"The real problem, however, wasn't the morals of Japanese society, which were probably no better or worse than they had always been. It was the Bank of Japan and Mr. Mieno's own predecessors who provided the profusion of cheap money in the first place, rolled out in a deliberate attempt to soften the blow to Japanese exporters of their rising uncompetitiveness. The Bank itself underwrote the mountain of bubble credit, to the point where the land under Tokyo's Imperial Palace was worth more than all of California.

"And those who seized on this cheap credit to engage in speculative behavior were, above all, the amakudari, or Finance Ministry mandarins who 'descended from heaven' to take leadership positions at Japan's jusen -- a fair approximation of America's Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac. Jusen were a network of specialized housing lenders that, amid the cheap money boom, experimented with dazzling new innovations such as 100-year mortgages and lending to the real estate speculations of the Japanese mafia.

"Mr. Obama's moralizing understandably strikes a chord, just as Mr. Mieno's did. But don't examine the thesis too closely. It was the ever-changeable errors of monetary policy, not the unchanging shortcomings of human nature, that created both countries' bubbles. Mr. Obama's call for Americans to repent makes a nice homily. The real lesson, however, concerns the systematic mispricing of credit and the corrupting and destabilizing forces that flow from it."

-- Holman W. Jenkins Jr., Wall Street Journal

Holman Jenkins on the Fresh Prince of DC

2009-04-20T10:18:00.000-07:00

"Why did we elect President Obama? Because we wanted to see him in the Oval Office. We wanted to see him wearing the trappings of the presidency, to revel in his choice presidential dog and presidential swing set, to make us feel good about ourselves when he's fawned upon by foreigners.

"Washington Post columnist Michael Gerson correctly fingered what's been wrong, however, with Mr. Obama's policy agenda ever since he became a serious risk for the nomination: It's been nothing more than a boilerplate, unanalytical distillation of standard Democratic talking points of the sort you might receive from a first-year DNC intern -- 'as though [Mr. Obama] were some conventionally liberal backbench senator suddenly thrust into immense influence. Which, of course, he is.'

"It's going to be a long four years if Mr. Obama doesn't develop some convictions about something beyond his own specialness."

-- Holman W. Jenkins Jr., Wall Street Journal

Jefferson's Opinion

2009-04-15T21:23:00.000-07:00

"To compel a man to furnish contributions of money for the propagation of opinions which he disbelieves and abhors, is sinful and tyrannical."

-- Thomas Jefferson (1779)

Prescient Orwell

2009-04-07T10:06:00.000-07:00

"We have sunk to such a depth that the restatement of the obvious has become the first duty of intelligent men. "

-- George Orwell (1939)

Adam Smith on Barack Obama?

2009-04-03T11:13:00.001-07:00

"The man of system, on the contrary, is apt to be very wise in his own conceit; and is often so enamoured with the supposed beauty of his own ideal plan of government, that he cannot suffer the smallest deviation from any part of it. He goes on to establish it completely and in all its parts, without any regard either to the great interests, or to the strong prejudices which may oppose it. He seems to imagine that he can arrange the different members of a great society with as much ease as the hand arranges the different pieces upon a chess-board. He does not consider that the pieces upon [a] chess-board have no other principle of motion besides that which the hand impresses upon them; but that, in the great chess-board of human society, every single piece has a principle of motion of its own, altogether different from that which the legislature might choose to impress upon it."

-- Adam Smith, The Theory of Moral Sentiments (1759)

SEIU & Obamacare

2009-04-03T10:32:00.000-07:00

"...Card check [Democrat's 'Employee Free Choice Act'] is all about helping SEIU [Service Employees International Union] take over the health care sector; Mr. Obama's health care plan is all about pouring more government revenues into [SEIU President Andy] Stern's bailiwick. That's why the two are related. Private sector unionism hasn't fared well in recent decades (think GM), but labor has flourished in the public sector, where union bosses can maximize the return on their political clout while insulating their members from the competitive pressures of the marketplace. Obamacare would make Mr. Stern king of 17% of GDP.

"Maybe it's not a coincidence that Massachusetts, which in recent years introduced a universal health care mandate, is also the scene of a big SEIU organizing campaign. Boston's SEIU chapter is furiously pushing to unionize the big teaching hospitals. It's already put two years into Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center, and up next are Massachusetts General Hospital and Brigham and Women's Hospital. The union has also successfully organized more than 20,000 home health assistants in the state and has won an agreement from Christi Health Care not to oppose its efforts to unionize about 13,000 employees at six hospitals owned by the Archdiocese of Boston.

"Card check would certainly make this work easier. The health-care revolution, it seems, will be unionized."

-- Brendan Miniter, Wall Street Journal

UAW of Obama

2009-04-01T13:28:00.000-07:00

"Earlier this month Ron Bloom and Steven Rattner, key figures on the Obama auto task force, traveled to Detroit and met with United Auto Worker President Ron Gettelfinger. Their meeting was off the record but presumably it was cordial. Mr. Rattner may be a Wall Street financier and Mr. Bloom a restructuring expert -- but both now are part of the Obama administration and UAW workers and retirees supply the Democrats with massive votes and manpower in key battleground states of the Midwest.

"'It would be hard to win the presidency again if everyone [in the upper Midwest] is out of work,' notes Forbes Magazine's veteran auto specialist Jerry Flint. 'General Motors will get the money to survive for sure. There is no way any administration would risk losing an election for a few billion dollars.'

"The UAW's Mr. Gettelfinger and GM's now-former CEO Rick Wagoner actually deserve credit over the last couple years for major surgery on GM's labor costs. During the crucial negotiations 18 months ago, however, Mr. Gettelfinger took a rare public snipe at Mr. Wagoner for not personally showing up at the bargaining table. He heaped praise instead on GM CFO Fritz Henderson. Now Mr. Wagoner is out courtesy of the Obama administration -- which tapped Mr. Henderson to take over.

"Look also at the standoff between UAW workers and GM bondholders that's been holding up a government-sponsored reorganization. Some of those unsecured bondholders bought the GM debt that was used to finance the UAW health care trust -- and now they're being offered 33 cents on the dollar while the UAW trust is being offered 50 cents for essentially the same IOUs.
All this means you can expect the fine print of any GM bailout deal to leave the UAW plenty of reason to be grateful to the administration. Watch what Team Obama does, not what it says. Mr. Henderson, a GM lifer, wasn't picked to wage war on the UAW or radically shrink the company and thus employment. On the contrary, don't be surprised if the administration finds ways to sweeten the deal by funneling taxpayer dollars to the UAW that bypass GM, such as by subsidizing the UAW health care trust directly."

-- Brendan Miniter and Holman Jenkins, Wall Street Journal

Farce Multiplier

2009-03-31T12:24:00.000-07:00

"Team Obama's claim that each dollar of stimulus spending will create more than a dollar of GDP took a beating yesterday at a forum organized by the Council on Foreign Relations in New York. An economist from the Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis reported that according to models relied on by the central bank, stimulus spending costs far more than it delivers in economic growth.

"The source of this critique is especially damaging to the administration's position. Obama economic advisers Christina Romer and Jared Bernstein argued in a recent paper that a dollar of stimulus spending yields $1.60 of economic output. The authors say they reached their estimate largely by relying on macroeconomic models used by the staff of the Federal Reserve in determining this 'multiplier' for stimulus spending. White House economic policy chief Lawrence Summers has also suggested that government stimulus yields roughly $1.50 of GDP for each dollar spent.

"During yesterday's panel discussion in New York, Ellen McGrattan, a monetary adviser at the Minneapolis Fed, said that models consulted by Fed staff suggest not a multiplier of 1.6 or 1.5, but something 'closer to zero.' Ms. McGrattan, who earned her economics Ph.D. from Stanford, also serves as a research economist for the National Bureau of Economic Research. Joining her on the panel was NBER colleague Anna Schwartz, who in her storied career collaborated with Milton Friedman on A Monetary History of the United States. Ms. Schwartz attacked a 'mystical belief' in fiscal stimulus and said that there was no economic analysis behind claims that government spending can restore economic growth.

"Ms. Schwartz noted that 'fiscal stimulus did not end the great contraction' that began in 1929, nor did it work for Japan in the 1990s. Speaking of the Japanese, she added that 'they paid lavishly' for stimulus programs, and the principal result wasn't economic revival, but massive government debt."

-- James Freeman, Wall Street Journal

Welcome To The Banana Republic

2009-03-30T14:16:00.000-07:00

"Remember when a trillion-dollar budget deficit seemed unfathomable? Well, that was only a few weeks ago. With the $800 billion economic de-stimulus, the second tranche of the TARP bailout, and the Obama mortgage rescue plan, this year's deficit is estimated by most private forecasters to approach $2 trillion.

"But it could get worse, much worse. The deficit could soon spiral to between $2.5 and $2.9 trillion in 2009. A compelling and frightening report by investment advisors at Casey Research notes that 'if the tax revenues fall, the deficit may even exceed the total U.S. budget of 2008: $2.9 trillion.' Yikes, this is banana republic-type borrowing.

"As the Casey Research report notes, these are much bigger levels of debt than during the New Deal, which topped out at 50% of GDP in the 1930s. Today's debt of 70% of GDP could quickly reach 100%, and perhaps as high as 120%. A new Heritage Foundation report points out that FDR's New Deal raised spending by 1.02% of GDP, whereas the Obama New New Deal raises spending by 2.45% of GDP.

"And the real deficit will only grow with Mr. Obama's massive new budget plans, unless you subscribe to his fantastically optimistic scenario for the return of growth. Kevin Hassett, an economist at the American Enterprise Institute, says that projected borrowing by Uncle Sam over the next ten years has already increased by a gargantuan $5 trillion just since the January 2008 Congressional Budget Office baseline was established.

"Why are the numbers spiraling out of control? Aside from all the new spending, tax revenues have dropped off a cliff, as the recession vaporizes corporate profits, corporate hiring and capital gains. We are likely to see a huge decline in revenues, perhaps by 20 to 25% this year.

"These numbers are so gargantuan that even Keynes would probably be cringing right now. What's needed is a dose of Friedmanism, says Chris Edwards, budget analyst at the Cato Institute. He reminds me that Milton Friedman concluded that New Deal programs only 'hampered recovery from the contraction, prolonged and expanded unemployment, and set the stage for a more intrusive and costly government.' Now what we have is the New Deal on steroids."

-- Stephen Moore, Wall Street Journal

Dumb As A Box Of Rocks

2009-03-30T14:00:00.000-07:00

"The good news is that the Obama administration's task force charged with revamping the auto industry has concluded what many suggested last year before massive taxpayer bailouts. The task force is now saying the best chance for success for both GM and Chrysler 'may well require utilizing the bankruptcy code in a quick and surgical way.' Now they tell us -- after $22 billion in taxpayer subsidies have been poured into the two companies.

"The bad news is that the Obama White House is now clearly deep into industrial policy by forcing out General Motors chief Rick Wagoner and most of his board. Mr. Wagoner, who joined GM in 1977, agreed to leave as one of the White House's conditions for more federal aid. The moves give President Obama political cover as he contemplates just how much taxpayer money to pour into the auto industry.

"But the moves also represent another step on the road to the dystopia that Ayn Rand depicted in her novel Atlas Shrugged. Rand envisioned an America in which bureaucrats dictated terms to both management and labor as it allocated state favors. As Michael Vadum of the Capital Research Center notes, such state managerialism is a peculiarly foreign concept to America. He quotes the Italian dictator Mussolini as saying: 'Fascism should more appropriately be called corporatism because it is a merger of state and corporate power.' That merger is now underway here, at least until Mr. Obama and his Democrats get through the next couple of elections with the help of a grateful UAW."

-- John Fund, Wall Street Journal

Carney on Geithner the Toxic Avenger

2009-03-26T11:31:00.000-07:00

"The markets loved Tim Geithner's latest bank-rescue plan, leading to a huge rally in the stock markets and media declarations that the Treasury Secretary had 'uncooked' himself with Monday's announcement.

"But reality may soon settle back in. The New York Post reports Thursday that 9 in 10 living laureates of the Nobel Prize in Economics are down on the plan. Even Paul Krugman is convinced that it won't work.

"And in Wednesday's Financial Times, another left-wing heavy hitter, Jeffrey Sachs, called the plan theft from taxpayers. He laid out in clear detail how the government-provided leverage and nonrecourse loans would lead to investors' overpaying for bad assets and leaving taxpayers with the bill. 'The idea of private-sector price-discovery is . . . flimflam,' he wrote.

"There's not necessarily any contradiction in the disparate reactions of the markets and the economists -- what's good for the banks may be bad for taxpayers and the public fisc in the long-term. But the rather cautious responses from economists from across the spectrum do illustrate a principle made famous by another Nobel laureate no longer with us -- there's no such thing as a free lunch, as Milton Friedman liked to say. Even Mr. Geithner can't wish away that law of economics."

-- Brian M. Carney, Wall Street Journal

Jenkins on Geithner's Gamble

2009-03-26T11:28:00.000-07:00

"By the New York Post's informal survey, more than 90% of several dozen living Nobel economics laureates don't like Tim Geithner's toxic assets plan, albeit for a variety of reasons. But the most cogent was offered by Columbia's Joe Stiglitz, who essentially asked: What plan?

"The Geithner formula would leave the FDIC with the losses if the economy continues to deteriorate and loan assets go bad. If the economy improves, private investors (hedge funds) would get the profits. How is that different from now? With the assets still on the banks' books, the FDIC bears the risk of a continued economic collapse. If the economy recovers, private investors (bank shareholders) get the profits.

"A year ago you could believe a quick fix for the banks might mean a soft landing for the economy. We're past that now. With industrial production plummeting around the world, and with trade flows dropping at the sharpest rates since the 1930s, the illness has metastasized far beyond the US banks. Meanwhile, fear of an uncontrolled US bank failure is off the table because, since last fall, all restraints have been broken through as the Fed's printing press has been hooked up as the system's respirator.

"What all this may sadly mean is that the Geithner plan amounts to little more than a shell game with respect to the real issue -- whether the economy will continue to fall apart. If it does, there will be massive loan losses ahead and the FDIC may face an impossible task trying to make good on all its commitments out of real (non inflationary) resources.

"Maybe that explains the Obama budget's sunny outlook predicting recovery later this year -- which allows the administration to duck any question of massive contingency funding for the FDIC to cover the failure of Citigroup and friends."

-- Holman W. Jenkins Jr., Wall Street Journal

Ribstein on TALF

2009-03-25T08:25:00.000-07:00

"The government could just give the banks the money, but that would be a 'bailout,' and not too popular right now. The government also could buy the assets for the inflated values they're currently booked at. But that would be a bailout and not too popular right now. So we have an elaborate shell game. The government subsidizes private equity companies to buy the assets at inflated values. . . . Although most people don't understand this right now, they will come to understand that 'non-recourse' means that the buyers are exposed only for the minimal payments they're making on these hugely leveraged deals. . . . [and] taxpayers, who provided most of the money, will bear most of the loss."

-- University of Illinois law professor and corporate governance expert Larry Ribstein, writing about the Obama Treasury's toxic asset liquidation plan

Cowen on New Fed Actions

2009-03-23T12:50:00.000-07:00

"The more the Fed takes on its balance sheet, the more the long-run independence of the central bank is damaged. Monetizing so much government debt is what Third World nations do. Draining the new money from the system will someday be a problem. It may introduce a round of 'beggar-thy-neighbor,' central bank-engineered currency depreciations . . . . If this fails the U.S. economy, and the stock market, will test new bottoms."

-- economist Tyler Cowen, on the Federal Reserve's decision last week directly to finance government spending

Gregg on Obama Budget

2009-03-23T12:47:00.000-07:00

"The practical implications of [the Obama budget] is bankruptcy for the United States. There's no other way around it. If we maintain the proposals which are in this budget over the 10-year period that this budget covers, this country will go bankrupt. People will not buy our debt; our dollar will become devalued."

-- Republican Sen. Judd Gregg, who was President Obama's choice for Commerce Secretary until his withdrawal, on the White House's $3.6 trillion budget.