Obama's Huge Blind Spot: Iran

     While I am not unpleased with what's going on with the Obama administration in the Levant, I am constantly displeased with Obama's fact-free rhetoric concerning Iran's nuclear ambitions (ambitions which, when the Shah ruled Iran, America promoted).

     There is no evidence of any current nuclear weapons program, and, in fact, the Iraq war haters (of which I count myself) have to deal with the NIE that says Iran stopped what little they had that qualified as a nuclear weapons program in 2003 as a result of the Iraq War.

     So, predictably, this is bad news

     "While Obama is taking the lead on policy towards Iran, the administration will soon announce that Dennis Ross will become a special envoy to the country[.]"

     Putting Dennis Ross in charge of Iran policy feels like declaring war on Iran. Let's all hope Dennis Ross suffers a career-ending (and severly painful) case of hemorrhoids, and let's hope Obama wakes up on Iran before we get in another war.

Sanity Makes Me A Bit Teary-Eyed

     I watched President Obama speak about Energy today.  I know, I know, all the Conservatives are saying this recent economic downtown is really the result of Bill Clinton's economic policies, and if it wasn't for the Bush tax cuts of 2001, 2002 and 2003 (widely trumpeted as being good for the economy) this would be worse than the Great Depression.  Personally, however, I am glad that we have a sane President.

Obama Has Many Choices

     We can almost assume that not 100% of the people Bush appointed were idiots.  There are thousands of political appointments, and he didn't know them all personally.  Bush didn't get in any trouble at all, for anything he did as President, so I'd like to thank the shoe-thrower.

     Here are some people who work for the government, or government started entities, and a review of them:

Thomas Stall	USAID Iraq Director	Worse than Worthless. Still saying "stay the course." Knee-jerk privatizer, people be damned
Raymond Gilpin	USIP Assoc VP (Econ)	Knee-jerk privatizer, somewhat forthright with bad news, not impressive, non-native English speaker
Paul Brinkley	Dep. UnderSec'y of Defense for Bus. Transformation	Not brilliant, still too pro-Business, but pragmatic. Keep
John Herbst	State Dept. Coord for Iraq Reconstru	worthless

Obama, Wasting His Time, America's Time

     Obama is going to have a press conference to announce the Secretary of Veteran's Affairs today.  Is anyone going to try to convince me that putting him in front of a bunch of flags, telling us who is going to have a job, and giving us the rosies of his resume, is a useful use of time? 

     Obama isn't President yet, but he's already wasting our time.  The media, and people who tune into the media, for such events, are also to blame.

     This is one of the things I hated about the Bush administration, when a lot of the top officials in the entire country would be seated around a table with Bush, or standing in front of a bunch of flags, acting as stage props while Bush spoke, as if they were a bunch of trained seals.  I know Bush believed in that kind of craziness, that the words sound more important if you can waste important people's time by making them stand behind you when you speak them, but I was hoping Obama was more intelligent than that.

Sarah Palin Cost McCain the Election (UPDATE1)

UPDATE 1: Added paragraph about McCain's motivations

     Not because she is retarded.  Not because she has the policy acumen of your average hockey mom, but because she has no experience.  The morning she was selected I knew it was all over for John Sidney McCain III.

     See, you can argue that the Biden selection was a semi-cynical ploy to beef up the Obama ticket's foreign policy credentials, but I don't see how it helps with the current economic situation.

     No, the Palin selection undermined the most effective argument the McCain campaign had.  This argument had been used by all the major McCain supporters.  Before that it had been used extensively by the campaign of Hilary Clinton.  It was an argument that made me worry.  It was an argument which I know was influencing some people who might not have wanted to vote for Obama for other reasons (racism, Hillary supporters).

     The Palin selection undermined the experience argument completely.

     So, we have three choices.  We can believe that McCain had no idea about what every Republican in America was saying about Obama and experience.  We can believe that this choice was forced on him by Ralph Reed, or the likes of him.  Or we can believe that John Sidney McCain the Third wanted the Democrats to win.  The most generous answer, of course, is the last.  And if it is true, we should thank John McCain. : And even if it isn't, we should thank him for a mostly decent fight.

U Chicago Hospital and Obama, Perhaps Nasty

Michelle Obama was earning about 130K, then started earning 195K more per year when Obama was elected U.S. Senator.  The hospital says the higher salary is "in line" with other V.P.'s salaries.

Less than a year later, Obama tried to insert an earmark to give the hospital where she works a million dollars. 

Sigh.

Illinois State Senate versus Alaska Governor

Alaska has 670,000 people!  Each Illinois State Senate district has about 215,000 people!

Then Obama won the Illinois-wide race, with about 12,830,000 people.

I am Happy?

I'm not carried away, but I like foreign policy, and Barack Obama chose a foreign policy specialist.  I had recently heard some rather surprisingly nice things about Evan Bayh, being a former Governor in Indiana, his role in Title IX and some other women's issues, and his father's role in Civil Rights.  He would have been the Domestic Policy choice, and I'm "happy" that, instead, a foreign policy person was chosen.

Combined with McCain's specialization in military/overseas matters means we might have some serious foreign policy debates which, regrettably, won't get much past the establishment position.

Independents View of VEEP Dem Potentials

Indepedents are more pro-Biden than the other four Democrats listed.  They are listed in order.

Candidate	Fav-Unfav	Spread
Biden	42-29	+13
Bayh	31-21	+10
Kaine	24-23	+1
Sebelius	18-21	-3
Clinton	39-57	-18

Data from Rasmussen as quoted at FiveThreeEight.com

Muslim Commie Obama Seeks To Discourage Wealthiness

We all know that when the government taxes something, it goes away.  Well, people aren't going to want to be rich after Obama-commie is done destroying America!  This death-defying reporting brought to you by the Washington Post:

So Called Liberal Media Loves to Call Obama un-American

Memos have been leaked from the Hillary Clinton campaign, and the only one the "so called journalists" (like Howard Kurtz, Reliable Sources) care to mention on television is ONE memo whose strategy was NOT adopted.  Mark Penn wanted to call Obama un-American, to emphasize his foreign-ness and emphasize he wasn't born and raised in Iowa (McCain was born in Panama).

The media wants to say things, but the major players can't come right out and say awful things.  Russia Today can't really call Saakashvili "the new Hitler" but they can find useful idiots who will say it, and run that interview, over and over.  The message comes across rather similarly.  This is obviously the case throughout journalism, and therefore it doesn't take much imagination to figure out why CNN and others are pointing to ONE, UNUSED leaked memo, over and over, to the exclusion of anything else the leaked Clinton memos might say.

Tax Policy

Obama is suggesting he'll raise capital gains tax rates, perhaps up to 20%, on people earning more than 250,000.  Why stop there?

Why should we tax perspiration more than speculation?  Is there a shortage of investment funds in America, and too much work being done?  Do we need to favor the investor class, over the working class?

The truth is people wealthy enough to make a living in investments have always been a potent force, striving for the best deals, and generally appearing the best dressed and most refined of all petitioners.  The following is from Gouverneur Morris, the person who actually wrote the Constitution ("the finish given to the style and arrangement of the Constitution fairly belongs to the pen of Mr. Morris." --James Madison) and so, whose understanding one must divine if one wants to closely parse its particular turns of phrase.  He said this during the 2nd Constitutional convention, as he described his desire to reserve the Senate for the rich people, and have the House of Representatives watch over them like hawks.  Remember, the Convention then chose him to actually write the Constitution!

[The rich] will have the same effect here as elsewhere if we do not by such a Gov't keep them within their proper sphere. We should remember that the people never act from reason alone. The rich will take advantage of their passions and make these the instruments for oppressing them. The Result of the Contest will be a violent aristocracy, or a more violent despotism. The schemes of the Rich will be favored by the extent of the Country. The people in such distant parts can not communicate & act in concert. They will be the dupes of those who have more Knowledge & intercourse. The only security agst. encroachments will be a select & sagacious body of men, instituted to watch agst. them on all sides.

Admittedly, the people, with the internet, can more easily act in concert now, but, then again, so can the rich.