I have a new piece up at Power Line, "Four Deaths and a Rule Change."  For anyone interested, it's here.

I also have a new piece up at Hudson New York, "Is The Free Press Failing Us?"  For those interested, it's here.

SATURDAY,  JULY 11,  2009

BULLETIN - AT 9:22 P.M. ET:  All right, I know it's Saturday night, but drop everything.  Wrap the pizza, freeze it, get out of the house.  Bring your children if you can.  If you can't, those are the breaks.  But get out now!!  We've received the final warning:

WASHINGTON — If the Senate doesn't pass a bill to cut global warming, Democratic Sen. Barbara Boxer says, there will be dire results: droughts, floods, fires, loss of species, damage to agriculture, worsening air pollution and more.

COMMENT:  Coward.  What she doesn't tell you, because she hasn't got the GUTS, is that, without this bill, hot-fudge sundaes will melt before you get to that little smidge of fudge they always put at the very bottom, just under the vanilla ice cream.  I guess she didn't want to break our hearts.

But you see the handwriting.  Unless Barbara gets her way, you're doomed.  Not her.  Just you.

July 11, 2009   Permalink

 
WELL AT LEAST HE WARNED US - AT 8:45 P.M. ET:  No one in Washington can say now that "I didn't know."  One of Hugo Chavez's biggest shots has revealed to the world exactly what the Chavez regime is really about:

Trade Minister Eduardo Samán unveiled at a business forum President Hugo Chavez's Economic and Social Development Plan, which will change the guidelines related to domestic and foreign trade...

...The chavista government will only approve foreign investment which ensures the transfer of technology to industry. "Not all are beneficial and bring progress to society's well being," Samán said, who added: "Don't be afraid when I speak of Marxism. It is the only system which does not exclude."

COMMENT:  Said and done.  But wait.  You can be sure that the next observer who accuses the Chavez regime of being pro-Communist will be called a "McCarthyite."  That's the way the game is played.

July 11, 2009   Permalink 

WHITE HOUSE RALLY FOR IRAN - AT 8:24 P.M. ET:  The Iranian-American community is notoriously fractured, but one faction at least managed a demonstration for Iranian rights at the White House today:

WASHINGTON -- Hundreds of protesters, many of them Iranian-Americans, marched from Capitol Hill to the White House on Saturday, most holding Iranian flags and chanting demands for the U.S. to take more action after Iran's disputed election.

After marching through several blocks of downtown Washington, more than 200 people rallied in front of the White House. They shouted demands for President Barack Obama and leaders of other countries to "reject the sham elections, impose complete sanctions."

They also shouted "death to Ahmadinejad," referring to the Iranian president whose disputed June 12 re-election prompted days of street protests in Iran. Some carried pictures of Neda Agha Soltan, a young woman who bled to death in a Tehran street. She became a symbol of the postelection protest movement after videos of her death by gunfire were posted online.

COMMENT:  This is potentially important.  As we reported earlier, Iran is about to present the "international community" with a negotiations package.  The danger is that it will suck the "negotiations yesterday, negotiations today, negotiations tomorrow" crowd into endless talks, during which the repression in Iran will be effectively ignored.

But if Iranian-American dissidents organize, can stay reasonably united, and can avoid being co-opted by pro-mullah operatives posing as something else, they can keep the heat on the White House and force public recognition of their position.  It's tough work, but that's what effective lobbying is about.  My fear is that skillful Iranian government negotiators will trap us into talks that will let the nuclear program go forward and let Tehran continue to arrest and harass its opponents.

July 11, 2009   Permalink

QUOTE OF THE DAY - AT 11:45 A.M. ET:  From Princeton Professor Angelo Codevilla, via columnist Jack Kelly:

"The distinctions between Republicans and Democrats, liberals and conservatives, are being overshadowed by that between what we might call the 'Court Party,' made up of the well-connected who see themselves as potters of the great American clay, and the 'Country Party,' the many more who are tired of being treated as clay," Mr. Codevilla wrote in National Review Online.

Hmm.  And Jack Kelly adds the following thoughts:

People in the Court Party think it proper they should decide what kind of cars the hoi polloi in fly-over country should drive and how much medical care they may have. Theirs is an aristrocracy not of birth but of connections, connections forged mostly by where they went to school. Every president since Ronald Reagan (Eureka College, 1932) went to Harvard or Yale.

For members of the Court Party, where you went to school is more important than what you learned there. Mr. Obama is said to be brilliant because he went to Columbia and to Harvard Law School. Someone who went to, say, the University of Idaho would be mocked mercilessly for thinking "Austrian" is a foreign language, that the United States is one of the largest Muslim countries, or that Canada has a president.

This nails it.  So true, so true.

July 11, 2009   Permalink

THE FAST HUSTLE BEGINS - AT 10:56 A.M. ET:  Iran is apparently preparing a diplomatic overture.  From Fox:

Iran is preparing a new package of "political, security and international" issues to offer the West, Reuters reported Foreign Minister Manouchehr Mottaki as saying Saturday.

"The package can be a good basis for talks with the West. The package will contain Iran's stances on political, security and international issues," Mottaki told a news conference.

President Obama said Friday the international community is "not going to just wait indefinitely" for Iran to renounce an interest in developing nuclear weapons.

Speaking as the G-8 summit concluded in Italy, Obama stressed that he and others were not looking for their summit partners to embrace sanctions at this week's meeting. Instead, he said that "what we wanted was exactly what we got" — a statement of condemnation about Iran's actions in the wake of its disputed presidential election.

COMMENT:  This is a period of extreme danger.  The Iranians are skilled diplomats.  They may offer just enough to keep talks going indefinitely, allow Obama to brag about the "success" of his approach, while the centrifuges in Tehran's nuclear program keep spinning. 

And some Europeans will grasp at any talk of negotiations, so they don't actually have to do anything, and can keep their business relationships with Iran strong.

The crunch will come in two months.  The G-8 nations gave Iran until September to show real progress in canceling nuclear-weapons projects.  I suspect that deadline will be allowed to slip if "encouraging" signs are detected in the Iranian attitude.  We've all been here before, especially with North Korea.

This will be a major test for Obama - torn between reality and his party's increasingly delusional left wing.

July 11, 2009   Permalink

RASMUSSEN STEADY - AT 10:34 A.M. ET:  We've been following the presidential polls closely, as they've become a major story.  Well, the actual story is the president's decline.  Today's Rasmussen tracker shows no change from yesterday, not good news for a president who's abroad.  Often, a foreign trip gives a president a boost, but those days appear to be over.  Mr. Obama's overall approval remains steady at 51-48 approve.  Ras's presidential approval index - the gap between those who strongly approve and those who strongly disapprove, is at -7, with more in the disapproval column.

This rapid decline began at the end of last month and shows no sign of reversing.  Other polls have the president stronger, but there's been an overall decline in some of them as well.  There have also been dramatic declines in state polls, especially in key states like Ohio and Virginia.

July 11, 2009    Permalink

THE PRESIDENT IN THE OLD COUNTRY - AT 10:27 A.M. ET:  We give credit where it's due here.  President Obama made a very solid speech about Africa yesterday.  It may be that only a person of color could have given such a speech, bluntly stating reality to people who've been made into professional victims by the usual suspects:

L'AQUILA, Italy | President Obama on Friday said African countries cannot blame colonialism for problems caused by corruption and their own bad governance as he embarked on his first trip as president to sub-Saharan Africa.

Mr. Obama also announced that he has secured a commitment from major countries to spend $20 billion on food security aid, or $5 billion more than expected from world leaders meeting in Italy this week. But he said rather than simple assistance, this money will be managed "to help people become self-sufficient, provide for their families and lift their standards of living."

"We do not view this assistance as an end in itself. We believe that the purpose of aid must be to create the conditions where it's no longer needed," he said.

And...

He said he delivered that message in Italy at a meeting of major economies and African countries, when some fellow leaders started blaming "colonialism and other policies by wealthier nations."

Mr. Obama said he told them the parallel between Kenya and South Korea, which 50 years ago had similar-sized economies. Today South Korea's economy is nearly $1 trillion, while Kenya's is about $30 billion.

Excellent analogy.  Have you read that in The New York Times?  I don't think so.

It's great to hear the president speak some truths that needed to be spoken.  I recall the days, not long ago, when African diplomats would float around New York in their native garb - often running up huge lists of parking tickets - and thrill Manhattan's chic hostesses with their presence.  Everyone groveled appropriately and nodded knowingly as the diplomats spoke of 1) oppression, 2) colonialism, 3) racism, 4) imperialism, and 5) capitalism.  At the end of the session, one distraught audience member would always ask, "What can we do to help?"  Another would apologize for the West and its entire history, going back to prehistoric times, to racist dinosaurs.  Everyone left, feeling very good about themselves, not realizing that the "diplomats" were often relatives of some gunslinger in power back home.

Maybe Obama can make some headway.  I wish, however, he had the same moral clarity about other parts of the world as he has about Africa.

July 11, 2009   Permalink

FRIDAY,  JULY 10,  2009

EMBURRISED - AT 6:12 P.M. ET:  From AP, via Fox News: 

Embattled Illinois Sen. Roland Burris said Friday he won't run for a full term in 2010, making official the end of a short Senate career clouded by questions about his appointment by disgraced former Gov. Rod Blagojevich.

Burris, the only black U.S. senator, said he was bowing out of the 2010 race because of the burden of raising money to pay for a campaign.

"I was called to choose between spending my time raising funds, or spending my time raising issues for my state. I believe that the business of the people of the state of Illinois should always come first," Burris said.

COMMENT:  His Senate appointment was a public embarrassment, and he never recovered.

Republicans have a great chance in Illinois, which trends Democratic, but which periodically elects Republicans to statewide office.  Will they seize the chance?  Outstanding Congressman Mark Kirk is ready to run, but an apparently egotistical state chairman, Andy McKenna, says he may want to make the race, effectively forcing Kirk into a primary, which Kirk may not want to endure.  Again, self-destruction.  We'll know this weekend if the state chairman wants to be the architect of victory, or the designer of the Titanic.

July 10, 2009    Permalink

DOES GEN. POWELL REGRET? - AT 6:03 P.M. ET:  I've always been baffled by Colin Powell.  By the usual accounts, he was a fine military officer...until he started mixing military with political decisions, and became the consummate bureaucrat.  Last year Powell burned up his prestige by entering national politics and endorsing Barack Obama.  Now he seems to be having some second thoughts, or some thoughts, as Cheri Jacobus, writing in The Hill, notes:

“We can’t pay for it all!”

Colin Powell, a powerful ally of President Obama, rather astonishingly uttered this truth last weekend about Obama’s job performance.

The piece asks this question:

Just what part of candidate Obama’s agenda of big government, big taxes and redistribution of wealth did Powell not understand? Or, as many suspect, was he so blinded by the celebrity of Obama that he threw common sense out the window and joined in the mindless, meaningless chant of “Yes we can!”?

And...

Colin Powell now claims that he “never would have believed that we would have budgets that are running into the multitrillions of dollars, and we are amassing a huge, huge national debt that, if we don’t pay for it in our lifetime, our kids and grandkids and great-grandchildren will have to pay for it.”

Really??? He never would have believed the most liberal senator in Washington would spend, spend, spend?

COMMENT:  Powell's credibility on non-defense issues is, to put it mildly, marginal.  He still wears Teflon armor on defense and foreign policy, for some ridiculous reason.  He escaped all blame for mistakes in Iraq, and his chief deputy, Richard Armitage, was ultimately revealed as the man who blew Valerie Plame's cover.  There's a time to go into private life.  Maybe that time, for the always dignified Gen. Powell, is now.

July 10, 2009   Permalink

RASMUSSEN - AT 10:09 A.M. ET:  We've been following the Rasmussen daily tracker carefully, as it chronicles the decline of the president.  As always, we stress that a poll is a snapshot of the moment.  However, a trend over time is more persuasive.

This morning's Rasmussen poll shows virtually no change from yesterday.  The president's overall approval remains at 51% approving, 48% disapproving.  Other polls show him stronger, but the trend in other polls is also downward.  If he falls below 50% in a few respected polls, there will be a psychological effect, as much within his own party as within the opposition. 

To demonstrate the trend, please note that overall approval on June 10th stood at 57-42.  On May 10th it was 58-41.  On April 10th it was 55-44.  On March 10th it stood at 56-43.  And on February 10th it was 60-38. 

So, the president has had his ups and downs.  But the narrowest gap we see in the list above is 11 points, in April.  Today's gap of three points tells the story.

July 10, 2009   Permalink

IRAN STILL BOILING - AT 9:04 A.M. ET:  We may have taken our eye off Iran, but the Iranian dissidents are still battling, at the risk of their lives.  We thank journalists like Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi, who keep us informed every day of events in their native country.  Without them, we'd be getting very little of real depth.

The Jerusalem Post has today's angle:

Iranians prepared for another violent day of confrontations between demonstrators and security forces on Friday, after riot police used tear-gas against hundreds of demonstrators who defied government warnings and swarmed the streets to commemorate the anniversary of a student massacre in 1999.

According to an eye-witness speaking to ABC, two people were killed during protests Thursday.

"The crowds were too large to contain - it seemed like everyone was out on the streets. I saw people parking their cars in the middle of the streets and joining the rest of us," another witness said Thursday.

The demonstrations quickly turned grim. "The basiji were pulling people out of their cars and violently beating them, just because they were honking their horns in support of the protesters. But what really amazed me," said one protester in a phone interview from Teheran, "is that we stood by each other. Many of us selflessly helped our brothers and sisters out on the streets."

At the same time, there is treachery in the West.  One of the worst offenders in terms of collusion with Iran is German business.  There's a great organization in Europe known as Stop the Bomb.  It exposes the awful cooperation between German industry and the mullahs.  Here's an example.  The translation to English is awkward, but understandable:

Andreas Benl, speaker of Stop the Bomb, declares:  "That the lobbyists of the German trade with Iran continue with their business in full peace of mind, while the regime that they supply brutally breaks down the Iranian protest movement is an unbelievable scandal.” According to Benl this counted all the more as the German economy was directly involved in the oppression within Iran: “The regime uses surveillance technology from Siemens as well as electric batons ‘made in Germany’.”  
Especially the activities of the German-Iranian trade chamber have repeatedly been met with strong criticism at home and abroad. Just last year in November the private organization held a seminar at the Hamburg Kempinsky Hotel on how to do export business with Iran successfully despite sanctions. Among other newspapers, the Jerusalem Post and the Wall Street Journal reported on this event. One of the invited speakers was a representative of the Melli bank, on which the EU has imposed sanctions. Also the latest statements by the Tehran representative of the DIHKeV, Daniel Bernbeck, stating despite the suppression of the protest movement he didn’t have “moral problems” doing business with Iran, caused international outrage.

COMMENT:  We quote that to show that there are Europeans who are concerned, and are confronting the moral rot in European countries.   But so far the impact of Stop the Bomb and groups like it has been minimal.  Money talks.  I've always felt it talks louder in Europe than in America.  The lucrative trade with Iran is creating an enormous obstacle to effective action against the Iranian regime. 

July 10, 2009   Permalink

WHAT?  CAN THIS BE TRUE? - AT 8:40 A.M. ET:  From The New York Times:

DETROIT — Believe it or not, General Motors has a hit car on its hands.

Amid the gloom of bankruptcy and a miserable market for new vehicles, G.M.’s new Chevrolet Camaro muscle car is winning over consumers looking for a little excitement in a bland landscape of look-alike sedans and watered-down sport utilities.

G.M. sold 9,300 Camaros during the month of June — more than either its entire Buick or Cadillac divisions could muster on their own.

And with G.M. expected to emerge Friday from bankruptcy as a newly constituted company, it is hardly surprising that the Camaro will play a starring role in the company’s coming-out party and news conference at G.M.’s Detroit headquarters.

COMMENT:  Now just wait.  You must not believe a word of that.  Just ignore it.  Pass it by.

Are these miserable capitalist Bush-loving exploiter swine actually telling us that if a company builds a car people want, they'll buy it?  Do you know how dangerous that kind of thinking is?  It may lead to companies surviving without government control?  Do you want to go back to the dark ages?  Do you?

Send messages to Al Gore and Michael Moore.  Get them on the case.  The Camaro can still be stopped!  Look at the pictures.  It's a militaristic menace, designed by Karl Rove!

Fast - before they make money on it!

July 10, 2009   Permalink 

BABY, IT'S NOT WARM ENOUGH OUTSIDE - AT 7:59 A.M. ET:  The Senate is delaying the "climate change" (formerly known as global warming before all the embarrassing facts came out) bill.  Barbara "please call me Senator" Boxer is the liberal-in-charge:

The Senate does not plan to make any serious moves toward approving a climate change bill until September, a month later than its leaders' previous expectation.

Sen. Barbara Boxer today told reporters that she will not draft a climate change bill in her Environment and Public Works Committee until September, throwing the timetable for action in the chamber into doubt on one of President Obama's top legislative goals.

COMMENT:  This provides an opportunity for the Republicans, and their allies around the country, to mount a major challenge to the bill, with the aim of peeling away moderate Democrats.  The "climate change" bill that passed the House is radical, and could have devastating economic effects...just as we're learning that the global warming hysteria is thoroughly unjustified.

This is a time to educate the American people.  When informed, they will act with their phone calls, polling replies and voices.  The president's poll numbers are going down because voters are responding to facts about wild spending, zero results, and crazy hype.  The same can happen with "climate change" legislation that won't change any climate, will make select individuals very rich, and potentially hurt far more than it will help.

But opposing isn't enough.  Republicans must have, and have quickly, their own legislative program - practical, attractive, and easy to understand.

July 10, 2009   Permalink

STAY HOME, SARAH? - AT 7:50 A.M. ET:  The hits on Sarah Palin continue.  Now The Hill reports that some Republicans don't want her coming into their states and districts to campaign for them:

Republicans facing tough elections in 2010 don’t want Sarah Palin campaigning with them.

Though the soon-to-be-former Alaska governor is seen as popular with the conservative grass roots, several Republicans said she’d help them by staying home in Wasilla.

Several of these Republicans hail from districts or states carried in 2008 by President Obama, a frequent target of Palin’s criticism. Republicans must keep these districts and win others where Obama is popular if they are to gain seats next year.

GOP Rep. Lee Terry (Neb.), who squeaked out a victory despite his district’s overwhelming turnout for Obama, said he’d rather have House colleagues campaign for him than Palin.

COMMENT:  Okay, but there's actually less here than meets the eye.  Palin is a strong conservative.  In swing districts you want to convince voters that you're closer to the center.  By definition, a swing district is one in which the victorious candidate reaches across party lines for votes.  If you need Democratic votes, you may not want to be linked with Sarah.

It's the same, of course, for Democrats.  I'll bet there are some moderate Democratic members of Congress who, privately, would not want President Obama in their districts, especially as his poll numbers are slipping.  They certainly wouldn't want Nancy Pelosi.

Sarah has yet to be tested on the fundraising, base-building campaign trail in an off-year election.  We'll only know as we get into the 2010 campaign combat how popular, or not, she really is, and who invites her in.

July 10, 2009   Permalink