it's not a question of who is rght or wrong but what is right or wrong that counts.
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  		today

today

Monday February 8th, 2010

Geoff to speak in Palm Beach with Jack Hoban
Clarifying American Core Values -
"What we all can learn from the Marines' Ethical Warrior training."

If you want Geoff to come to your city email geoff@geoffmetcalf.com.

Meanwhile please tell ten people to tell ten people to tell ten people...


World & National News

Gates calls for new sanctions on Iran

Iran has rejected Western overtures and the international community has no choice but to move toward imposing new sanctions over its nuclear program, U.S. Defense Secretary Robert Gates said on Monday.

"We must still try and find a peaceful way to resolve this issue. The only path that is left to us at this point, it seems to me, is that pressure track but it will require all of the international community to work together," Gates said at a joint news conference with French Defense Minister Herve Morin.

Ukraine election result: Voters react

Ukraine's opposition leader Viktor Yanukovych is heading for a narrow victory over his rival, Prime Minister Yulia Tymoshenko, in the country's presidential election, according to electoral officials.

Mr Yanukovych has called on Mrs Tymoshenko to step down, but she has refused and is expected to challenge the result.

Obama Won't Negotiate on Stalled Healthcare Bills

Republicans gave a chilly reception Monday to President Barack Obama's invitation to discuss health care in a bipartisan, televised setting later this month, part of the White House effort to revive the stalled legislation.

The House and Senate GOP leaders said Obama and his fellow Democrats must shelve their long-debated health care bill, which was on the verge of becoming law until Republican Scott Brown won a special Senate election in Massachusetts last month. The White House says Obama has no plans to do so but is willing to hear Republicans' ideas.

Obama Asks GOP to Join Health Talks

President Barack Obama, seeking to give new momentum to his languishing health-care legislation, said he would sit down with Republican and Democratic lawmakers to exchange ideas on an issue that has deeply divided the parties.

With the GOP united against the Democratic bill, Mr. Obama said Sunday he would ask Republicans "to put their ideas on the table." The half-day meeting will be Feb. 25 and broadcast live, the White House said.

Where does the Tea Party go from here?

As the National Tea Party Convention concluded this weekend, it's clear that the Tea Partiers are propelled by two competing claims -- a principled commitment to fiscal conservatism and a serious case of Obama Derangement Syndrome.

The first group remains true to the roots of the movement as it emerged almost one year ago amid bailout backlash. They feel like modern Paul Reveres, warning their fellow citizens about the unsustainable nature of our government's deficit spending and unprecedented debt.

They still have an important civic role to play in our national debate.

Recession chugs on, except in government

White House apologists were quick to point to the unemployment rate decline from 10 percent to 9.7 percent as evidence that the recovery is gathering momentum and that President Obama's policies -- especially his $787 billion economic stimulus bill Congress approved last February -- are "working." But the back story behind the figures provides cold comfort.

First, the drop to 9.7 percent unemployment does not reflect the creation of new jobs that normally accompanies an economic recovery. The number of new jobs is actually declining. Total nonfarm payroll employment, for example, dipped by an additional 20,000 positions after a December decline of 150,000 positions. The unemployment rate the day Obama took office last year stood at 7.6 percent and 134.6 million people had jobs. When he signed the economic stimulus, Obama promised the bill would bolster the economy sufficiently to keep unemployment below 8.0 percent. But the unemployment rate has exceeded 8.0 percent since last fall, and total employment stands at only 129.5 million. The stimulus has been a bust.

Toyota plans to recall 300,000 Priuses

Toyota plans to recall about 300,000 Prius hybrids worldwide over a brake problem and will notify the U.S. and Japanese governments Tuesday, a news report said, as a top executive will testify before U.S. lawmakers over recall woes that have tarnished its reputation for quality and safety.

The recall of the gas-electric Prius will cover the latest version of the cars that went on sale since May, Kyodo News agency reported late Monday.


Defiant Iran set to begin higher enrichment of uranium

Iran will begin enriching uranium to 20 percent from Tuesday, the Islamic republic's atomic chief announced on Sunday just hours after being told to do so by hardline President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad.

The decision raises the stakes in a dispute with the West less than a week after Iran had appeared to accept a UN-drafted nuclear deal on the supply of fuel for a research nuclear reactor in Tehran.

Geithner Says U.S. Will 'Never' Lost AAA Rating?

Treasury Secretary Timothy F. Geithner said the U.S. is in no danger of losing its Aaa debt rating even though the Obama administration has predicted a $1.6 trillion budget deficit in 2010.

“Absolutely not,” Geithner said, when asked in an ABC News interview broadcast yesterday whether a downgrade is a concern. “That will never happen to this country.”


ADL Gives Obama 'F' Grade for Accomplishment

The Anti-Defamation League’s National Director Abraham Foxman gives President Barack Obama an "F" – a failing “report card” grade after his first year in office for his “accomplishments” in dealing with the Israeli-Palestinian conflict.

In an exclusive Newsmax interview, Foxman also criticized the Obama administration for failing to show leadership in supporting reformers in Iran in the wake of their recent presidential election. He also warns about the growing threat posed by homegrown Islamic terrorists and sleeper cells in the United States.

U.S. Magazine Circulation Falls 2.2 Percent

Circulation for U.S. magazines slipped more than 2 percent in the second half of 2009. A new report also finds that single-copy sales, which are more lucrative for publishers, dropped more than 9 percent.

With the weak economy still putting a damper on spending and with plenty of free reading available online, overall magazine circulation in the U.S. fell 2.2 percent in the six months ended in December. That's according to industry figures released Monday.

Toward a Different Fiscal Future
Tax increases can't plausibly address the coming entitlement crisis.

Moody's Investors Service's warning last week that the AAA credit rating of the United States is in jeopardy raises fresh concern about the nation's fiscal health. The question to ask about the president's eye-popping budget, also rolled out last week, is whether it prepares the country for its future—or shackles it to past decisions that our leaders would rather not confront.

President Obama's blueprint gave us a federal budget deficit for fiscal year 2010 of $1.6 trillion, about 10.6% of GDP. While one expects bigger budget deficits in a downturn, the administration expects the deficit and debt buildup to persist. By 2013, it forecasts that deficits will bring about a debt-to-GDP ratio of 72%, unprecedented in our experience except during a major war.


Can Republicans Win the Senate?
Evan Bayh, Kirsten Gillibrand, and Barbara Boxer's Senate seats are all in play.

Three of the nation's best-known political handicappers -- Larry Sabato, Charlie Cook and Stu Rothenberg -- all agree that if the mid-term elections were held today, Republicans would likely pick up seven Senate seats: Arkansas, Colorado, Delaware, Illinois, Nevada, North Dakota and Pennsylvania.

To capture a Senate majority, Republicans would also have to win Democratic seats in another three states. "Where do the other three seats come from?" asks Mr. Sabato.

Waiting for Godot
The Obama Years
    by Geoff Metcalf
"The whole problem with the world is that fools and fanatics are always so certain of themselves, but wiser people so full of doubts."
        -- Bertrand Russell

Reasonable people can (or should be able to) reasonably disagree if or when they honestly consider facts that may contradict their preconceived opinions and prejudices. However, unfortunately, especially in the partisan environment of politics, reason, honest analysis and fairness too quickly become victims of the “us versus them” thing.  Politics has become a blood sport where the only golden rule is “the team with the gold makes the rules”.

Politicians who were elected to represent the best interests, wants and desires of their constituents, morph into petty, agenda driven competitors quick to eschew reason for partisanship. Sadly, this axiomatic reality is universal and not exclusive to any one party. Politics is supposed to be the art of compromise. However, increasingly, politics is a blood sport personifying the absolute worse elements of abuse of power under the color of authority.

President Barack Obama, a year after promising "change" and a Kumbaya tsunami of bi-partisan cooperation, now reluctantly admits he has not succeeded in bringing the country together. In a recent People magazine interview, the president begrudgingly  acknowledged an atmosphere of divisiveness that has washed away the lofty national feeling surrounding his inauguration a year ago. 'That's what's been lost this year ... that whole sense of changing how  Washington works,' Obama said.

"What I haven't been able to do in the midst of this crisis is bring the country together in a way that we had done in the Inauguration," he said, referring to last January 20 when hundreds of thousands flooded into Washington to see him sworn in as America's first black president...before reality and buyer's remorse.

The simple reality is Obama has failed because he and his party's leadership (or critics will argue LACK of leadership) have failed...failed to do what they said they would do...and failed to do anything the "way" they promised.  

Notwithstanding lofty eloquance, concensus and "unity' cannot be mandated by imperial decree. Partisan acrimony is not and cannot be bridled by harangue, bullying or bludgeon.  Politics is the art of compromise and the facts in evidence demonstrate that this administration and this Democrat led congress has not been disposed to engage in compromise. Rather the democrats have embraced a hamfisted "our way or the highway" forced imposition of their will.  

Now, in the wake of  spelunking poll numbers, rampant buyers remorse, and a previously unimagined nostalgia for the Carter administration, democrats seem shocked, amazed and confused that over half the country does not approve of not only what they are trying to do, but how they are doing it.  Blaming the dark sky and coming ice age on Bush (or Reagan or Nixon or Eisenhower or Lincoln) is a worn out dog that flat out ain't gonna hunt.

When Mr. Cool was promising "change" little did ANYone assume that change might result in a republican winning Teddy Kennedy's Senate seat.

It is a sad reality that at the same time our military has significantly improved the quality of the U.S. Troops who serve, the civilian leadership and politicians have regressed to a level reminisent of uneducated fuedal bullies. The military is smarter, more fit, better equipped, and as committed as any generation from Valley Forge to Iwo Jima or Pleiku to Bosnia. We have an all-volunteer military that is dedicated to protecting YOU. Conversely, the political arena is littered with disingenuous, duplicitous partisans who long since have abadoned their constituents for the next political victory (and/or pork laden earmark).

I have recently re-read Dr. Robert Humphrey's 'Living Values for a New Millenium' in preparation for an upcoming  February seminar.

In a 1997 speech before he passed away, Dr. Humphrey said, top leadership, in both our civilian or military government, is afraid even to discuss this apparent decisive need for new thinking both at home and overseas.  It was 13 years ago he observed, the news media and public opinion polls advise, "The people sense a moral bankruptcy in Washington" with a bickering inability in government to face these deeper problems.

Wherever you go, you are little bit safer because of the military and yet more at risk because of the coat room schenanigans of congress. Wherever the military sets a boot EVERYONE has a friend, a defender and a champion. However politicians seem more concerned about the next PAC contribution than the wants, needs or well being of the very people they were elected to represent.

Ambrose Evans-Pritchard once wrote,“Moral relativism has set in so deeply that the gilded classes have become incapable of discerning right from wrong. Everything can be explained away, especially by journalists. Life is one great moral mush—sophistry washed down with Chardonnay.”



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