President Obama is in big trouble. He’s lost Maureen Dowd over his response to the recent failed terrorist attack.
While this growing skepticism by the mainstream media and a few responsible libs is welcome, it might have been helpful to have some of that during the 2008 election. No matter which candidate won this election, we still would have had the same struggles with domestic security as long as we continue on the current failed path. So it’s way past time to rethink our current strategy.
Some new failed jihadist won’t be seeing his 72 virgins.
Not yet anyway. How fortunate those people on that Northwest flight are that the guy didn’t quite have the procedure down for detonating the explosive and that their fellow passengers and airline crew members took the initiative to deal with the threat. This won’t always be the case. Someday the United States may have to deal with a terrorist who knows exactly what he or she is doing, and has a foolproof plan to finish off the attack and to cause massive destruction in this country. When we are confronted with a legitimate threat to the safety of our nation, what will the federal government do about it? There’s this theory going around that we can prevent future terrorist attacks by setting all sorts of limits on the innocent passengers just trying to get from point A to point B on an airplane. Brilliant idea. After all, wannabe terrorists / jihadists will follow all these rules too, won’t they? What lunacy is this? We won’t prevent future terrorist attacks this way, and in the process of “doing something” about the obvious problem, the feds might end up making us less safe by restricting our ability to protect ourselves in the event that someone slips by those watchful TSA agents.
One thing we can do that we are not doing is to be more selective about who gets visas into this country. DHS should also consider keeping an eye on those folks once they get here, and kick them out once their visas expire. I don’t think the federal government has a clue how to handle domestic terrorist threats, and this was true before President Obama arrived in Washington. DHS is a flawed idea to begin with, and I often wonder if we would be safer leaving the security of the homeland in the hands of the FBI, rather than a large collection of bureaucrats. We are where we are, so let’s take the situation as it is. Enforcing current laws would go a long way toward keeping our country safe. This also goes for illegal aliens of the non-Muslim variety that we have been ignoring for years under many different Presidential administrations.
Make it harder for potential terrorists by improving our intelligence gathering and enforcing current laws and visa restrictions. Don’t keep imposing silly restrictions on airline passengers that do nothing to improve our chances of surviving a plane ride. It’s common sense, something a lot of the fellows and ladies in DC seem to lack these days.
I agree with Hitch. Read what he said in Slate.
Reason’s Jacob Sullum says there should be no fundamental right to health care.
A right to health care thus requires the government to infringe on peoples liberty rights by commandeering their talents, labor, and earnings. And since new subsidies will only exacerbate the disconnect between payment and consumption that drives health care inflation, such interference is bound to increase as the government struggles to control ever-escalating spending. Rising costs will also encourage the government to repeatedly redefine the right to health care, deciding exactly which treatments it includes.
Enforcing this right demands an involuntary contribution from all taxpayers. Once it is decided by our Congress that health care coverage is mandated for all of us and primarily funded by tax dollars, then we are in danger of losing more than the ability to buy private health care coverage. I used to think that the relationship between liberty and the health care debate was tenuous at best, but it’s becoming clear to me how wrong I was about that. Expanding the reach of government into health care beyond its current bureaucratic regulations and restrictions is something we need to consider carefully before going forward with such plans. While I’m proposing all these radical things, how ’bout one more – if we are going to copy another country’s health care system, we might want to copy one that actually does what President Obama promised with expanding choices and competition for the health care consumer, and take steps to make health care more affordable for every American. That’s not what the Senate and House are doing with their proposed health care legislation. We need to start over from scratch and try again if we want a health care bill that is truly worthy of the claim of “health care reform”.
Read Sullum’s entire argument here.
Now for something a little different and somewhat holiday-themed…
Eventually it would come to this – someone is compelled to attack the lifestyle and behavior of Santa Claus. Honestly, there’s just no good excuse for that.
Some “public health expert” in Australia says that Santa is a bad example for children. The charges against St. Nick include encouraging obesity and drinking alcohol while steering his sleigh through the wide-open sky, where he is endangering no one but himself and the reindeer. Seriously, dude, if you want to bring a more significant complaint, you might point out the greed it produces in otherwise sweet little children who produce gigantic lists of very expensive gifts which they fully expect to get on December 25th. And God bless the parents who try to keep up with those expectations out of their own finite pockets, because there will never be enough money to cover that wish list. This reminds me of a certain group of Americans who expect their fellow citizens to completely finance their health care bills…and believe that the federal government has an endless pot of money to meet their every need.
At some point, there needs to be a reality check for the little kiddies as well as the uninformed chuckleheads in the citizenry of this country — the money has run out. The credit cards are maxed. Time to cut the spending.
Sorry to burst anyone’s bubble – but Santa Claus is totally fictional. Focusing on his perceived sins is amusing, but unnecessary. On the other hand, the financial damage this proposed health care “reform” will cause in this country, is quite real — and yet some Americans refuse to wake up to the truth that the federal government doesn’t have the money to do what our Congress has promised us it would do.
We certainly can’t say that the President of the United States lacks self-confidence. When asked to grade his performance as President, he gave himself a B+. Can’t imagine what kind of curve he was using to come up with that grade. Obviously our citizen king knows better than we do about, well, everything, so his falling ratings have nothing to do with the great job he’s doing. Got that, fellow citizens? Also, he has the hardest Presidential job ever of any administration, because President Obama had to follow the flawed administration of George W. Bush. There’s no question that President Obama has faced tough challenges, but his reaction to them hasn’t even been close to getting these problems fixed.
Forget about grades. Let’s talk about objectives.
“You don’t get rid of poverty by giving people money.” – P.J. O’Rourke
How about fixing the economy? One way to help with that is to support American businesses by creating conditions that allow American businesses to succeed, prosper, and add critical new jobs for the American people. What has he done about that? Nothing. The stimulus has not gotten the job done, and besides that, I think Bush deserves most of the blame / credit for the end results of the current stimulus package. Instead of rolling back the Bush spending, and spending less taxpayer money, the Obama administration is spending MORE. Odd way to prove your differences from the previous President. While President Bush wasn’t exactly known for his fiscal discipline (which I have pointed out on numerous occasions – look it up), President Obama also knows that there is no money for all of these ambitious programs he plans to implement. There is no money for health care “reform” as he would like to see it, or for the greenies’ fave – cap and trade. You don’t fix an economy by raising taxes on the few productive taxpayers who still have jobs and the employers who supply these jobs. That’s what this administration has in mind. The common phrase we most hear is “taxing the rich”. Well, who exactly is rich? Eventually, the answer will be YOU.
FIXING THE ECONOMY SHOULD BE THE MOST IMPORTANT PRIORITY OF THIS ADMINISTRATION. IT IS NOT.
But maybe I’m being unfair. Maybe the reason President Obama was elected had more to do with his foreign policy views than with his ambitious domestic agenda. Let’s see how he’s progressing with the kinder, gentler America through non-cowboy diplomacy, shall we?
The desirable objective is for our allies to be able to trust us and for our enemies (rogue states, terrorist sympathizers, and similar other bad actors) to fear and respect us. I don’t think this is the perspective of our current President. He doesn’t seem to make the distinction between countries who can be legitimate partners in our struggle against the jihadists, and countries who need to be controlled in their quest for world domination through nuclear power. Without any sticks in sight, the bad actors will continue to be bad actors, because they know the threats of the UN and of the United States are worthless.
The disregard of our allies, especially the Brits, is a glaring mistake when we consider that there are only a few countries left in the the world who share our views on potential nuclear opponents like Iran and North Korea. We need all the support we can get in trying to keep Iran and North Korea from extending their nuclear capability into dangerous weapons that threaten the security of the United States and our allies. President Obama, with all his grand rhetoric about America being a friend to the world, needs to spend more time talking to our allies than proposing grand schemes to single-handedly talk rogue states out of their nuclear ambitions. Right now, our allies don’t trust us. That has more to do with the fluid foreign policy strategy of President Obama, and not as much to do with Bush and the Iraq war.
How are we doing with stopping the bad guys? As far as Iran / North Korea is concerned, it’s a push. But Iran is getting more vocal and belligerent day by day, and at some point, it will be too late to stop them from getting nukes. It may already be too late. North Korea is still out there, although we haven’t heard much from them lately. Afghanistan is still a struggle, and I hope that the additional troops Obama is sending will be enough to get the job done.
Both the left wing and the right wing have reasons to be frustrated with the Obama administration. I just pray that someday there will be enough Americans who disagree with current administration policies that they will vote out the Democrat Congress in 2010 and President Obama in 2012. It can happen. The Republican Party just needs to get its own house in order first.
The House passed HR3962, commonly known as PelosiCare / ObamaCare, this evening, with 39 Dems voting against and one Republican (Cao) voting for it. The battle isn’t over yet. Let’s keep fighting.
In other news, this happened. Very cool of former President W.
Yes, the wins by Chris Christie and Bob McDonnell were important. I don’t think that the loss by Corzine in NJ was completely surprising. Even in New Jersey, at some point the voters had to say to themselves, “We’ve had enough of Jon Corzine, and his total lack of ability to be a competent governor.” Corzine’s loss can mostly be blamed on Corzine himself. But in this current climate, friendship with President Obama is not a very desirable quality either. Creigh Deeds recognized that, but distancing himself from the President didn’t help him much. He still lost. Before my Democrat friends pounce on the Obama statement, let me clarify a bit here – I’m not saying that the President doesn’t maintain a reasonable amount of popularity on a personal level, but his policies are becoming more and more unpopular. This is a factor, I believe, in some of these Republican wins this evening – that, and the uninspiring candidates the Dems were running with in this election.
Here’s what I think Republicans can take from tonight, regardless of the result of NY-23. It doesn’t mean that conservatives could win everywhere they run a candidate like Hoffman, although I would like to see the attempt. What this says to me is that the idea of abandoning conservatism to follow the moderates / independents wherever it is they are going is deeply flawed, and the national Republican Party needs to reconsider its strategy going forward. I understand why RNC Chairman Michael Steele thought he had to support the decision by the locals of Dede Scozzafava, even though I disagree with it. I also know that, in addition to being moderate / liberal in political ideology, she was also a very flawed candidate. If he was really concerned about letting the locals in NY-23 decide this race, then he should have kept RNC money out of it. This goes for the RNCC as well.
Newt, my man, you have lost so much more credibility with this endorsement. I’ve written you even further off than you were before this endorsement. Congratulations. You will never be President.
One last thing — we don’t need more consultants, focus groups, political hacks, or so-called experts who aren’t looking out for the best interests of the Republican Party and for conservatism specifically telling us what we really want or what we really need. The first thing we must do to fix the Republican Party is to fire all these false prophets and get back to basics.
That is all.
I agree with Congressman Joe Wilson. The President has misrepresented what the Democrats are proposing to do with our health care. Unfortunately, the rules of decorum prevent Republicans from saying what they think out loud unless it agrees with what President Obama has already said. After all, we know how well the Democrats follow the rules they impose on the minority party when THEY are the minority party, don’t we? While I much prefer Senator DeMint’s opposition strategy and admire his restraint during the President’s speech last night, I can tell you that there are many of my fellow conservatives who were yelling at our TVs and radios – mostly similar sentiments to those of Joe Wilson. This doesn’t make Wilson a Super-Patriot or the next “Republican revolutionary”. It just makes him someone who temporarily forgot that he gave up the right to challenge the President of the United States during his speech on national TV when he got elected to Congress. AND he apologized for it. Get over the indignation and let’s move on to what we were talking about – health care.
As far as the question of illegal immigrants getting health care under the House bill, sure the language forbids it, but when there are no explicit enforcement requirements, what guarantee is there that this won’t eventually happen? It’s happening now in the border states, especially in California and Texas. So that’s a legitimate concern.
There was nothing game-changing about the President’s speech last night. We will continue to oppose the proposals currently on the table, because these aren’t serious attempts to address the costs and inefficiencies we have with our health care system right now.
I will get to Dr. Arthur Laffer’s analysis in a future post. I have several initial comments on the subject of health care “reform” that I want to bring to the table before I get to his brilliant work.
If you want to talk about a subject that should be demanding the attention of the federal government right now (but is not) we should be talking about jobs, not health care. Don’t know how many times I have to say this but people with jobs would be far more capable of buying their own health insurance. There are ways the federal government could encourage / support private industry development and growth, and to make it easier for the job market to improve. The Obama administration appears to be more interested in implementing big revolutionary changes in health care than to deal with bread and butter issues like jobs and the economy.
We do not have a health care crisis situation in this country. That 47 million uninsured number — offered by the uninformed and the mediots (but I repeat myself here) is bogus.
From Mark Levin’s Liberty and Tyranny:
“In 2006, the Census Bureau reported that there were 46.6 million people without health insurance. About 9.5 million were not United States citizens. Another 17 million lived in households with incomes exceeding $50,000 a year and could, presumably, purchase their own health coverage [1]. Eighteen million of the 46.6 million uninsured were between the ages of eighteen and thirty-four, most of whom were in good health and no necessarily in need of health-care coverage or chose not to purchase it [2]. Moreover, only 30 percent of the nonelderly population who became uninsured in a given year remained uninsured for more than twelve months. Almost 50 percent regained their health coverage within four months [3]. The 47 million “uninsured” figure used by [Speaker of the House Nancy] Pelosi and others is widely inaccurate.”
The number of Americans who are uninsured has been massively inflated to exaggerate the extent of the problems we have with the current health care system as it exists today. This is intentional. There’s no possible way the American people could possibly be talked into an overhaul of the entire health care system without being persuaded that we have a crisis that demands immediate attention. Fortunately, this massive overreach by the Democrats and by the President of the United States with HR 3200 has caught the attention of average Americans, some of whom have been doing the job our Congressmen / Senators won’t do (reading the bill). I applaud those who have attended town halls to ask the tough questions to these Congressmen and Senators. Someone has to do it. It really shouldn’t be necessary to remind my fellow conservatives not to give the media, liberal activists, Democrats and the White House any ammunition to paint our side as a bunch of raving lunatics but I will say it again until it doesn’t need to be said.
One might interpret the previous commentary as an opinion that the American health care system as it exists today does not require any changes. We do not have a perfect health care system. With that said, the choices /options we have for health insurance are vastly superior to any system resembling single-payer or government-run health service programs. Of course it would be wonderful to get all Americans health care coverage, but what sacrifices would have to be made in order to get close to this goal? Is it even possible to spend enough money to provide all Americans coverage? Of course not. The debate here should be whether we must overhaul the current health care system to attempt to cover the relatively small number of uninsured Americans, or whether with a few small changes we can achieve the best combination of coverage and care for most Americans. The latter is my position on health care reform we don’t need a complete overhaul, just a few common-sense changes. What changes would I propose, on the compelling suggestion of economists like Dr. Laffer? I’ll save that for a future post.
That’s all the citizens opposing this health care reform want here – an honest debate where we are told the truth about the proposals currently being discussed for transformative changes in the way health care works in this country. We want our representatives to know and understand what they are voting on at least — if they can’t be bothered to do their job and read the entire bill. (And BTW, if the bill’s too long for Congress to read or understand, why not have some non-lawyers write bills in plain English? Controversial suggestion, I know.) Many Congressional Democrat “leaders” have been writing off their constituents as some uninformed rabble-rousers who are driven not by principle, but fueled by lobbyist cash. This is an extremely elitist, arrogant way for them to approach the conversation with us on health care reform. If you have the proof, show the evidence that citizens are being paid to protest and ask questions at town hall meetings by the insurance industry.
The Democrats in Congress don’t seem to care what we think, even though I suspect they know public opinion has been steadily turning against them on this issue.
I’m going to say a little something to my fellow conservatives who join me in opposition to ObamaCare, in whatever form it ends up taking. We can be passionate in our opposition without resorting to name-calling and personal attacks. I know that there is so much anger and frustration out there with the policies of this administration, but in this, we must continue to fight these policies with civility and confidence. We must not allow our passion to be used by the media to discredit our views because this issue is too important to surrender.
Now that I’ve got that out of the way, let’s get back to the conversation.