Sunday, January 25, 2009

Obama to KSM: I've Got Your Back, baby!

As expected, Barack Obama began his presidency last week with a flurry of Executive Orders, most to reverse Bush policies. Two notable ones:

1. E.O.'s to ratchet back the government's aggressive policies against terrorism since 9/11. An order to close the detainee detention camp at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba. Prohibiting aggressive interrogation techniques by the CIA, requiring the use of the Army Field manual.

2. Reversing the "Mexico City Policy", also called the gag-rule, that prohibits U.S. foreign aid going to family planning activities that counsel for abortion. Those funds are now available worldwide.

Let me translate those two Executive Orders for you:

1. Obama to Khalid Sheik Mohammed and the 250 most dangerous detainees in the world: I've got your back! Hang in there, we're coming to your rescue!

2. Obama to unborn babies worldwide: You, not so much. We're putting out a hit on you.

Sick.

What foolishness liberals perpetuate in the name of Progressiveness.

You haven't thought this through, lefties.

Given that Khalid Sheik Mohammed was not only the operational planner and mastermind of 9/11 and many other attacks, and that the CIA broke him and stopped further attacks using waterboarding: How else would you have gotten that information and stopped those attacks against Americans? Or, are you willing to sacrifice other Americans to soothe your conscience?

Given that at least 60 other detainees who were released by the Bush administration from Gitmo under pressure have returned to battle against American troops, are you willing to release these 250 most dangerous detainees? On American soil? Where are you going to put them now?

These are foolish and deadly policies.

And we're only one week in. Egads.

Wednesday, January 21, 2009

Ethical Cognitive Dissonance

So, I'm sitting in the cafeteria at work having lunch. The TV overhead is tuned to Headline News and, inevitably, Barack Obama.

Our new President is, on his first day in office, signing Executive Orders to frame out his rules of the road for his Executive Branch. First up: ethics reform. He's bringing change to ethics and transparency, he's saying, so that America can trust it's government again.

Wait a minute, I'm thinking. Isn't this the President whose nominee for Treasury Secretary (whose agency includes the IRS) is testifying in Congress and apologizing for being a tax cheat? Does Mr. Secretary's example mean that I can ditch my tax bill and not pay any penalties until and unless I get nominated for a cabinet appointment? Why not?

Wait a minute, I'm thinking. Isn't this the same President whose nominee for Secretary of State, in charge of our embassies and diplomatic policy worldwide and confirmed today in the Senate, has a conflict of interest the size of the her new fiefdom - having benefitted from the tens of millions of dollars her spouse has accepted from foreign governments for the Clinton Library Foundation. Isn't she a board member. Don't they have a joint checking account? Is she going to pressure a government who gave her family an easy $10 million?

Wait a minute, I'm thinking. Isn't this the same President whose nominee for Attorney General of the United States is apologizing for his role in lobbying President Clinton for a pardon for criminal fugitive Marc Rich based on cash donations from Rich's wife to the same Clinton Library Foundation?

Does his new ethics Executive Order include anything about not nominating a rogues' gallery of ethically challenged elitists to his own cabinet?

And I'm supposed to trust in government now?

I almost barfed up my sloppy joes.

Consider Me Depressed

Have you ever known a teenager, or been one, who not only believed that all of the adults who came before him were irrelevant and stupid and who not only believed that they knew everything but that they invented everything? That they were the first person in the world to ever have experiences?

That's the general feeling that I came away from yesterday's inauguration with. President Obama is one of those teenagers trapped in a 47 year old body.

I tried to get into the spirit of the day yesterday. Really, I tried.

There were plenty of high points: the amazing crowds, the parade of former presidents, the peaceful transfer of power that makes is our strength in the world, the pomp and ceremony, the Obama family revelling in their moment.

There were some low points: the classless Obama supporters heckling President George W. Bush with "na-na-na-na, hey hey, Goodbye" when he took the podium, when Bush has been extremely gracious during the transition. Rev. Lowery's needless racism in the benediction - longing for the day when "white will embrace what is right". Please.

And then there was the speech. Obama's speech. Dreadful. Downbeat. A cliched teenager with a microphone.

I could pick it apart line by line, but here's four quick examples:

1. "And to those nations like ours that enjoy relative plenty, we say we can no longer afford indifference to the suffering outside our borders"

Hey, junior, let's be clear: America is the most generous nation in the world in giving to those in need both within our borders and outside. Don't besmirch us to make yourself look good. Whether it's disaster aid, foreign aid, or coming to the defense of the defenseless America is there. Just look at Africa, where the Bush administration has pumped untold millions in Aids relief in the last 4 years. Africans love Bush. Apparently Obama has not heard that yet. But, he will invent foreign aid.

2. "What is required of us now is a new era of responsibility — a recognition, on the part of every American, that we have duties to ourselves, our nation, and the world,..."

Really? We've never been "responsible" before? Quick, remind me: which party was it that was pushing high-risk mortgages in the name of "affordability for all, even those who reasonably couldn't afford them? Which party? Which is the party of irresponsibility? Please.

3. "To the Muslim world, we seek a new way forward, based on mutual interest and mutual respect"

Really? Here's news, junior. Large parts of the muslim world would like to behead you and your family. Where's the "mutual respect" in that? Welcome back to the 9/10 world of denial.

4. "We will restore science to its rightful place..."

Let me translate that for you:

The Global Warming religionists are here to take over your lives, despite the irony of the words "bitter cold" being in most of our forecasts for the last month. And, hey by the way, we're not killing embryos fast enough.

That last one was where I turned off the speech. I did read the text in full later, which I would venture most of the rest of you did not. You should.

Yes, I wish the new President good health and safety during his term in office. Yes, I wish the nation will succeed under his leadership.

But, no I do hope that he gets through his agenda that he campaigned on enacted. It will be devastating for our country.

I'm bracing for the flurry of executive orders sure to come this week, and legislation shortly after:

- handcuffing our homeland security and intelligence agencies by forfeiting the tools that they need to go aggressively after the people who still want to destroy our country and kill us
- massive pork and taxation
- unrestricted abortion on demand from the most pro-abortion president we've ever had. Look for him to sign FOCA immediately.
- unionization of America through the "check-card" system, dismantling secret ballot elections that have thwarted intimidation tactics by the unions. Here come the thugs.

Lastly, let me say this: if President Obama yeilds to those loud voices on his left who want to criminalize policy issues and arrest Bush, Cheney, Rove, and adminstration officials who fought the War on Terror aggressively and kept us safe for the last seven years he will be making a huge mistake. If he does that, he will be unleashing mass civil unrest. Don't do it!

Consider me un-hopeful for Obama's first term - yesterday's pomp and ceremony notwithstanding.

Tuesday, January 20, 2009

Barack will need Jack Bauer

In the last few minutes before President Obama takes the oath of office as the 44th president, let me just say:

Thank you, President George W. Bush, for keeping our country and my family safe for the last seven years. No one expected, after the horror of 9-11, that we would not be attacked again on U.S. soil during your presidency. No one. And it was not an accident. You were, by necessity, the president of 9/12 - as none of your critics had to be. You did what you had to do to put us on offense and keep us safe. Thank you.

I think, I know, I fear that our new president will soon discover - if he hasn't already in his security briefings - that you were right to be as aggressive as you were in protecting us.

All you have to do is read the story reported yesterday on the Drudgereport - "Deadliest weapon reported so far, the Plague" - to know that we have Jihadist enemies worldwide sworn to bring the maximum death and destruction to our shores and that it will take an aggressive and sometimes distasteful fight to keep us safe.


40 Al Qaeda terrorists found dead from the bubonic plague. How did they get it? Clearly they are brewing up bio weapons to attack us with. Perhaps they were the weapon. What if you infected 40 people with plague and put them on planes to Dearbornistan Michigan or other high-muslim-population areas? We would have a problem on our hands that would dwarf 9/11.

So, tell me my lefty friends. Suppose you capture a jihadist terrorist - who is not a uniformed member of a recognized army - and you suspect that a plague attack is imminent or in progress. Are you going to refuse to do whatever it takes to get the information you need to protect America? Including waterboarding?

This is not a foolish hypothetical in our world today. It's very real. It's what George Bush has lived with every day since 9/12. And he acted on the intelligence to keep us safe.

I'm hopeful that Barack Obama will stay on offense and keep us safe, and not yield to the foolish pacifism of the left that he is beholden to and that will leave us vunerable again. That he will be a 9/12 president and not a 9/10 one. But, I am not optimistic.

Tuesday, January 13, 2009

Democrats Behaving Badly

Which Democrat is behaving most egregiously in the last two months:

-Rod Blagojevich – Illinois Governor. Caught by U.S. Attorney in a pay-for-play bid to sell the U.S. Senate seat vacated by PEBO. (President Elect Barack Obama).

-U.S. Attorney Patrick Fitzgerald. Announced that Obama is not implicated in the Blago scandal – even though he’s been taking testimony for years from Tony Rezko, who was the corrupt fundraiser behind both Blago and Obama. There’s a grand jury in Obama’s future.

-Barack Obama. To ease concerns about possible connections between corrupt Gov. Blagojevich, Obama investigated himself and pronounced himself clean.

- Mainstream Media (mostly Democrats), who meekly accepted Obama’s self-clearing report.
Roland Burris. Accepted the appointment from scandal-tainted Gov Blago that no one else would accept. So narcissistic that he named his kids Roland and Rolanda and his built a mausoleum to himself already.

- Harry Reid – U.S. Senate Majority Leader. Blocked Burris from taking his legally appointed seat in the Senate. 99 white senators – mostly Democrat – blocking the door from the only African American to be in their club.

-Nancy Pelosi. Speaker of the House of Representatives. She threw out all of the rules for the new Congress that allow the minority to present bills. Hey Republicans – sit down and shut up!

Hillary Clinton. Nominee for Secretary of State who has a monumental conflict of interest. The Clinton Library Foundation, of which she is an officer and a joint-checking account holder with Bill, has raised $500 million – including at least $50 million from foreign governments. How is she going to represent the U.S. in pressuring governments like Saudi Arabia when her name is on the endorsing line of a $10 million check from them?

-Bill Richardson. Resigned pre-emptively from PEBO’s cabinet because of his own pay-for-play scandal.

-Al Franken, Senate candidate in Minnesota who is stealing the election there in plain daylight.

- Secretary of State of Minnesota. Former member of ACORN, elected under the Soros-funded Secretaries-of-State project designed to help them get SOS’s in place to help them steal elections.


The winner is Barack Obama, for nominating Leon Panetta as Director of the CIA. This makes Obama the unserious President. We are at war since 9/11 with an entire Jihadist culture bent on killing us. Intelligence is as important as troops in this war. Yet, Obama chooses to nominate a political hack from the Clinton administration with zero intelligence experience to head the agency. It signals that he does not believe that we are at war. We will be vunerable again.

Hey, Democrats. What are you thinking in supporting these knuckleheads?