Good Ideas In Here

http://online.wsj.com/article/SB123854083982575457.html

WSJ.com - Inflation Is Tempting for Indebted Nations

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From The Washington Times: AIG chiefs pressed to donate to Dodd

Trevor Peterson sent you this:

AIG chiefs pressed to donate to Dodd

http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/mar/30/aig-chiefs-pressed-to-donate-to-dodd/

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Trevor Peterson attached this additional message:

Good ol' Chris Dodd

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The Washington Times top emailed stories:

HANSON: A foretaste of mob rule
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/mar/29/a-foretaste-of-mob-rule/

EDITORIAL: Protect us from the EPA
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/mar/29/protect-us-from-the-epa/

EXCLUSIVE: Hezbollah uses Mexican drug routes into U.S.
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/mar/27/hezbollah-uses-mexican-drug-routes-into-us/

McCain: Public financing is 'dead'
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/mar/29/public-financing-dead-mccain-says/

McCain has only kind words for Palin
http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2009/mar/29/mccain-has-kind-words-palin/

Projected Deficits

Thought this was an interesting graph.

Big Deficits

 

Candidate Obama vs. President Obama: Change We Can Believe In?

An article from www.miamiherald.com

Trevor Peterson has sent you the following story:

We're in real trouble.

Posted on Friday, Mar. 20, 2009

CBO: Obama's budget would double national debt over decade

By KEVIN G. HALL AND DAVID LIGHTMAN

The national debt held by the public would double over the next decade if President Barack Obama's budget is enacted into law, the nonpartisan Congressional Budget Office projected Friday.

The U.S. government would run budget deficits approaching $1 trillion every year for a decade under Obama's budget, the CBO said.

Deficits and debt that big are unsustainable over the long term, economists agree. They'd threaten to send inflation spiraling upward, threaten the nation's creditworthiness and the value of the dollar - China's prime minister publicly voiced concern about the safety of U.S. debt last week - and force up interest rates, as investors come to see the United States as a risky, debt-ridden economy. They'd saddle future generations with a debt payable only by cutting federal spending or raising taxes sharply.

Read More...

Link shared by trevor@utalum.org

Great article

http://article.nationalreview.com/?q=ZDQyYjEzMTg3ZDBjZTA4MzExNjU1MTE2MzkwYTRiMTc=&w=MA==

[Message sent by trevor@utalum.org via AddThis.com. Please note that the sender's email address has not been verified.]

Who's responsible for the Freddie/Fannie mess?

Freedom versus socialism in America

The statistics below blew me away. -tp


Speaking last month at an event sponsored by the Colorado Committee for Heritage, Sen. Jim DeMint (R-S.C.) explains why Americans must return to the principles of freedom and constitutionalism.

An excerpt:


I'm afraid that America is sliding towards socialism. Government is now the nation's largest property owner (controlling nearly 1/3 of the land mass), it effectively owns more than 1/3 of the profits of all businesses and more than 1/3 of the incomes of most working Americans. Government controls the majority of education and healthcare services in America. It owns the primary retirement income plan for most Americans (Social Security). The federal government, through a burdensome regulatory system and undecipherable tax code, effectively controls a significant portion of the nation's economic development and business activity. And now the government has gotten into the mortgage business!
America's style of socialism is more subtle and, on the surface, appears more benign than early twentieth century European socialism. America's federal government has not yet taken over or nationalized any industry, but it has increasingly expanded control through regulation, increased government ownership through confiscatory taxes, and in the case of healthcare, expanded control through fixed prices and mandatory service requirements.


Many on the Left now openly discuss socializing medicine and the energy industry, he warns. So what's the antidote? You'll need to read his full remarks for his answer. http://members.myheritage.org/site/R?i=v3Eu7ydN4fdZbeXMPDqMyg

Dear Mr. Obama

Wow!

A Picture Is Worth A Thousand Words

It is not hard to remember what that morning was like ... fear followed by great sorrow. Sometimes I don't think we as a nation see these pictures enough. Just to remember the tragedy of that Tuesday morning.

Newt takes on MSNBC over Gov. Palin's experience

I love Newt Gingrich.

History Repeats Itself

Wall Street Journal June 23, 2008; Page A16

"Appeasement that ends in war is a familiar theme of history."

Obama's Troubling Instincts

From the Wall Street Journal: Obama's Troubling Instincts, by Karl Rove


OPINION


Obama's Troubling Instincts

By KARL ROVE May 22, 2008

Barack Obama is ambling rather than sprinting across the primary-season finish line. It's not just his failure to connect with blue-collar Democrats. He has added to his problems with ill-informed replies on critical foreign policy questions.

On Sunday at a stop in Oregon, Sen. Obama was dismissive of the threats posed by Iran, North Korea, Venezuela, Cuba and Syria. That's the same Iran whose Quds Force is arming and training insurgents and illegal militias in Iraq to kill American soldiers; that is supporting Hezbollah and Hamas in violent attacks on Lebanon and Israel; and that is racing to develop a nuclear weapon while threatening the "annihilation" of Israel.

By Monday in Montana, Mr. Obama recognized his error. He abruptly changed course, admitting that Iran represents a threat to the region and U.S. interests.

Voters need to ask if Sunday's comments, not Monday's correction, aren't the best evidence of his true thinking.

Is Mr. Obama's first instinct to dismiss North Korea, the world's worst nuclear proliferator, as an insignificant threat? Is his immediate reaction to treat Venezuela as a wayward child, rather than as an adversary willing to destabilize the hemisphere? Is his memory so short he has forgotten the Castro brothers' willingness to aid revolutionary movements? Is he so shortsighted as to ignore the threat to Mideast stability that Syria's meddling in Lebanon and support for Hamas and Hezbollah represents?

Mr. Obama's Sunday statement grew out of a kerfuffle over his proclaimed willingness to meet – eagerly and without precondition – during his first year as president with the leaders of Iran, Syria, North Korea, Venezuela and Cuba. On Monday, he said it was a show of confidence when American leaders meet with rivals; he insisted he was merely doing what Richard Nixon did by going to China.

I recommend that he read Henry Kissinger's book, "The White House Years." Mr. Obama would learn it took 134 private meetings between U.S. and Chinese diplomats before a breakthrough at a Jan. 20, 1970 meeting in Warsaw. It took 18 months of behind-the-scenes discussions before Mr. Kissinger secretly visited Beijing. And it took seven more months of hard work before Nixon went to China. The result was a new relationship, announced in a communiqué worked out over months of careful diplomacy.

The Chinese didn't change because of a presidential visit. In another book, "Diplomacy," Mr. Kissinger writes that "China was induced to rejoin the community of nations less by the prospect of dialogue with the United States than by fear of being attacked by its ostensible ally, the Soviet Union." Change came because the U.S. convinced Beijing it was in its interest to change. Then the president visited.

The same is true with other successful negotiations. President Ronald Reagan prepared the ground for his meetings with a series of Soviet leaders by rebuilding the U.S. military, restoring confidence in American intentions, and pressuring the Soviets by raising the specter of a missile defense shield.

Reagan knew rogue states only change when they see there are real consequences of their actions, and when it is in their interest to change. This requires patience, vision, hard work and the use of all the tools, talents and relationships available to the U.S. We saw a recent example when Libya, fearful of American resolve after 9/11, gave up its chemical, biological and nuclear weapons programs. These programs, incidentally, were more advanced than Western intelligence thought.

Reagan knew he must not squander the prestige of the American presidency and the authority of the United States by meaningless meetings that serve only as propaganda victories for our adversaries. Mr. Obama seems to believe charisma and smooth talk can fundamentally alter the behavior of Iran, Syria, North Korea, Venezuela and Cuba.

But what might work on the primary campaign trail doesn't work nearly as well in Tehran. What, for example, does Mr. Obama think he can offer the Iranians to get them to become a less pernicious and destabilizing force? One of Iran's top foreign policy goals is a precipitous U.S. withdrawal from Iraq. This happens to be Mr. Obama's top foreign policy goal, too. Why should Iran or other rogue states alter their behavior if Mr. Obama gives them what they want, without preconditions?

On Wednesday, Mr. Obama said in Florida that in a meeting with the Iranians he'd make it clear their behavior is unacceptable. That message has been delivered clearly by Republican and Democratic administrations in public and private diplomacy over the past 16 years. Is he so naïve to think he has a unique ability to make this even clearer?

If Mr. Obama believes he can change the behavior of these nations by meeting without preconditions, he owes it to the voters to explain, in specific terms, what he can say that will lead these states to abandon their hostility. He also needs to explain why unconditional, unilateral meetings with Iran's Mahmoud Ahmadinejad or North Korea's Kim Jong Il will not deeply unsettle our allies.

If Mr. Obama fails to do so, voters may come to believe that he is asking them to accept that he has a "Secret Plan," and that he is hopelessly out of his depth on national security.


Mr. Rove is the former senior adviser and deputy chief of staff to President George W. Bush.

More Obama on Iran

I truly think he is making this stuff up as he goes along. . . .


From The Atlantic.com, by Marc Ambinder


On Iran, Parsing Obama, Without Preconditions Or Preconceptions

21 May 2008 10:10 am

About meeting with rogue leaders, what did Sen. Barack Obama really say, and what did he really mean?

Blargh, says the Obama campaign. All this word parsing is besides the point, is indicative of "gotcha politics" and the politics of distraction. Everyone knows that Obama meant.

Here's the campaign's official language:

"Barack Obama has always said that he is willing to meet with appropriate Iranian leaders at the appropriate time after due preparation and advance work by US diplomats. That's what he said last summer, and that's what he's said throughout the campaign. Preparation is not a precondition it is absolutely necessary to the success of any diplomatic effort. You need to build an agenda and open lines of communication, just as we would do with any country, But Barack Obama believes we must be willing to lead, just like Kennedy did, and just like Reagan did. And that's what he will do as president."

What we're trying to figure out is, what would it take for Obama to meet with the leaders of Iran? An invitation from Ahmadinejad or Ali Khamenei? Previous diplomacy? Concessions? An OK from the head of the PPD that it's safe to travel?

It's clear now that Obama would not, pledge, within the first year of his administration, meet directly with Mahmoud Ahmadinejad without "preconditions" and without equivocation. It IS clear that Obama would meet with Ahmadinejad (or Ali Khamenei) without forcing Ahmadinejad (or Ali Khamenei) to provably suspend uranium enrichment. It's also clear that Obama would be more willing to meet with these leaders than McCain.

Obama's campaign now uses the word "with preparation" as shorthand to refer to diplomatic advance work; other advisers use the word "unconditional" as a straw man to suggest that critics are accusing Obama of wanting to meet "unconditionally" with these leaders -- of course their would be "conditions" -- there just wouldn't be "pre-conditions." (Would there be .... post-conditions?)

SQUARE ONE
In July of 2007, Barack Obama was asked by a video questioner: "Would you be willing to meet separately, without precondition, during the first year of your administration, in Washington or anywhere else, with the leaders of Iran, Syria, Venezuela, Cuba and North Korea?....."

"I would," he answered.

Now -- in Obama's answer, he broadens the predicate, saying at one point that "we need to talk to Iran and Syria," which is not the same thing, necessarily, as talking to Ali Khamenei or to Ahmadinejad or to Assad, but contextually, given the question was about "leaders" and given that the questioner mentioned the phrase "without preconditions," it certainly sounds as if Obama was promising to meet, within the first year of his administration, without preconditions, with the leaders of Iran, Syria, North Korea, etc.

Moments after the debate ended, David Axelrod told reporters that Obama did not necessarily mean what he appeared to say:

"What he meant was, as a government, he'd be willing and eager to initiate those kinds of talks, just as during the Cold War there were low-level discussions and mid-level discussions between us and the Soviet Union and so on. So he was not promising summits with all of those leaders."
Axelrod accused Hillary Clinton, who had questioned Obama's approach, of making a distinction without a difference.

WHAT DOES "LEADER" MEAN?
Sometimes, it means the head of state or government. Sometimes, it means lower-level officials.
Susan Rice, an Obama adviser, parsed this very distinction, in her response to a question from Wolf Blitzer yesterday:

Rice:
"Well, first of all, he said he'd meet with the appropriate Iranian leaders. He hasn't named who that leader will be. It may, in fact be that by the middle of next of year, Ahmadinejad is long gone."

But to CBS News on October 15, 2007, Obama defined leaders in the conventional way:
Harry Smith: "You said, 'I will talk to so and so and Hugo Chavez and etc., etc.'"

Obama: "Exactly, and without preconditions."

And Obama's website brags that Obama is the only major candidate who supports tough, direct presidential diplomacy with Iran without preconditions.

Presidential diplomacy -- doesn't that mean diplomacy with Iran's president or supreme leader?

ON PRECONDITIONS -- THERE WILL BE CONDITIONS! JUST NOT PRECONDITIONS!
No preconditions, Obama said. Does that square with what Tom Daschle, a very senior Obama adviser, said this morning?

"When we talk about precondition, we say, everything needs to be on the table. I would not say that we would meet unconditionally; of course there are conditions that we would...are involved in preparation, in getting ready for the diplomacy."

Between the two end points, there's been an evolution.

In April, Obama: "So as a matter of principle, I will talk to any head of state after sufficient preparation in order to lay out what our interests are and to listen to them, but not to concede on the issues that are in our long term national security interest. So for example, meeting with Iran, if I were sitting at the table, I will be very specific."

Who injected the word preparation? A political adviser? What does that mean? Diplomacy under the level of principles? Obama's getting a briefing book and memorizing its contents?

Working backwards, here's Obama, speaking to Haaretz in October of 2007:

"I don't think it would be appropriate for us to engage in full-scale diplomatic discussions without some progress or some indication of good faith on the part of the Iranians,' the senator said. 'I do think the U.S. needs to send a signal to Iran that if they change their behavior that they have avenues available to them for improved international relations."

The day before, speaking about Hugo Chavez to Andres Oppenheimer of the Miami Herald:
"Under certain conditions, I always believe in talking. Sometimes it's more important to talk to your enemies than to your friends."

My best semi-educated guess is that (a) Obama originally spoke in shorthand and that (b) he has clarified, in his own mind, his position; (c) that he wants Democrats to hear "without preconditions" and independents to hear "with preparation" (which is a euphemism for extensive pre-presidential contact diplomacy.") and (d) that his advisers still aren't reading from the same page of talking points. Also: Obama wants to draw a much brighter line between his approach to Iran and North Korea's and the Bush administration's approach to those countries.... A political trap awaits Obama in this sense: how to best distinguish your diplomatic approach from President Bush's.... that requires a very very wide gap between the two approaches ... and how to reassure Americans that Obama does not believe in the messianic power of his own rhetoric and would not be willing to let Iran run roughshod over the United States? That requires a slightly narrower gap. After all, there _are_ low level and mid-level (and even senior level) contacts between Iran and the United States right now; the Bush Administration is negotiating with North Korea....


Marc Ambinder, an Atlantic associate editor, is blogging the 2008 presidential election from the roadshows. He might also write the occasional post about aviation, national security, and cognitive neuroscience. Mostly politics, though.
About Marc Ambinder Email Marc

Obama on Iran

So let me get this straight, Iran is not a threat to the U.S.? Then, why is he going to waste his time meeting with the leader of a "tiny" country who is not a threat to us? And didn't we learn on 9/11 that it doesn't take massive amounts of money to inflict harm on us. Does Obama think that only countries (or groups) that spend more than "1/100th" of what we do on the military are threats to us? So Al Qaeda would therefore not be a threat to us? I'm confused.

United States Security and the Strategic Landscape

I think Newt Gingrich is a real leader with bold ideas.

The Words Still Ring True Today

Its funny how, when I read Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address, I can't help but think of the debate raging today regarding what we should do in Iraq and the entire fight against Islamist extremists who would see us dead and our great nation destroyed. The American Civil War must have been terrible: 51,000 casualties in the Battle of Gettysburg alone; 620,000 Americans dead in total. The pressure on Lincoln to just let the South secede must have been very strong from some corners -- the war was sometimes referred to as "Lincoln's War," sound familiar? And yet, he resisted the easy road and chose to fight on for unity and liberty.

The freedoms we, and many in the world, enjoy today have only existed in practice for the last 200 or so years. The great cost we bear as the birthplace of liberty and justice for all is to ensure that it "shall not perish from the earth." Here are Lincoln's words at Gettysburg. Do they not still apply today? We should honor those who have sacrificed everything by insisting on victory.


Fourscore and seven years ago our fathers brought forth, on this continent, a new nation, conceived in liberty, and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war, testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived, and so dedicated, can long endure. We are met on a great battle-field of that war. We have come to dedicate a portion of that field, as a final resting-place for those who here gave their lives, that that nation might live. It is altogether fitting and proper that we should do this. But, in a larger sense, we cannot dedicate, we cannot consecrate -- we cannot hallow -- this ground. The brave men, living and dead, who struggled here, have consecrated it far above our poor power to add or detract. The world will little note, nor long remember what we say here, but it can never forget what they did here. It is for us the living, rather, to be dedicated here to the unfinished work which they who fought here have thus far so nobly advanced. It is rather for us to be here dedicated to the great task remaining before us -- that from these honored dead we take increased devotion to that cause for which they here gave the last full measure of devotion -- that we here highly resolve that these dead shall not have died in vain -- that this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom, and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from the earth.


I do truly believe in the notion of American Exceptionalism. This nation of ours is not here by accident. Listen to the Battle Hymn of the Republic sung by the U.S. Army Chorus for Pope Benedict XVI on April 16, 2008, and tell me that what we are doing is wrong and that we should abandon our mission in Iraq.

FedEx vs. Government Bureaucracy -- Newt Gingrich