Tuesday March 9th, 2010



World & National News

Biden: US to prevent nuclear Iran?

US Vice President Joe Biden expressed America's "absolute, total, unvarnished commitment to Israel' security" at a press conference in Jerusalem following a meeting with Prime Minster Binyamin Netanyahu Monday morning.
 
As such, Biden said, Washington was "determined to prevent Iran from acquiring nuclear weapons, and we are working with many countries around the world to convince Iran to meet its international obligations to cease and desist."

Rep. Massa Claims Dem Conspiracy Forced His Exit
Resigning congressman swings widely on last live radio show

In his final weekly radio show on Sunday morning, Rep. Eric Massa for the first time detailed the events he believes led to the sexual harassment complaint against him that prompted his resignation from Congress, announced on Friday, but effective Monday afternoon. Massa, a Democrat, also accused House Democratic leadership of conspiring to remove him from office ahead of the reconciliation votes on health care, given his vote against the legislation when it went before the House last November.
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“I was set up for this from the very, very beginning,” he said, on what Massa insisted would be the last broadcast of the Sunday morning show on WKPQ 105.3 FM in Hornell. “You think that somehow they didn’t come after me to get rid of me because my vote is the deciding vote in the health care bill? Then, ladies and gentlemen, you live today in a world that is so innocent as to not understand what’s going on in Washington, D.C.”

Nancy Pelosi's grip on House slips

House Speaker Nancy Pelosi is not accustomed to the word she’s been hearing far more frequently in recent days: “no.”

Over the past two weeks, Pelosi has faced a series of subtle but significant challenges to her authority — revolts from Democrats on the Ways and Means Committee, the Congressional Black Caucus, the Blue Dog Coalition and politically vulnerable first- and second-term members.


China committed to U.S. debt, wary on gold

China, the world's biggest holder of foreign exchange reserves, renewed its commitment to the U.S. Treasury market on Tuesday but said it would be wary of substantially boosting its gold holdings.

The country's chief currency regulator said China would attract more capital inflows this year, partly reflecting expectations of a stronger yuan, but he left the market none the wiser as to when Beijing might let the currency resume its rise.

ID Card for Workers Center of Immigration Plan

Lawmakers working to craft a new comprehensive immigration bill are proposing a new national biometric ID card that would be required of all U.S. workers. WSJ's Laura Meckler explains the proposal and the objections from privacy advocates.

Under the potentially controversial plan still taking shape in the Senate, all legal U.S. workers, including citizens and immigrants, would be issued an ID card with embedded information, such as fingerprints, to tie the card to the worker.

The ID card plan is one of several steps advocates of an immigration overhaul are taking to address concerns that have defeated similar bills in the past.


Obama Rips and Rewards Health Insurers?
Give Them $336 Billion Check

ABC’s Z. Byron Wolf reports: President Obama and Democrats launched a campaign to vilify insurance companies in the final stretch of their health reform effort.

Republicans, meanwhile, pointed out that those very same insurance companies would get huge checks from the government if health reform is enacted.

EU warns US against protectionism in Pentagon deal

The EU on Tuesday warned the United States against protectionism after a European-led consortium pulled out of the bidding for an Air Force contract, saying the terms had been altered to favor a U.S. company.

EADS, the parent company of Airbus, had partnered with Northrop Grumman to vie for the tanker project, but their consortium pulled out on Monday. They said the terms of the deal appeared designed to eliminate its design in favor of a smaller jet offered by rival Boeing Co.

The announcement left Boeing as the only bidder for the project.

Culled out
Obama administration will accept no more public input for federal fishery strategy

The Obama administration will accept no more public input for a federal strategy that could prohibit U.S. citizens from fishing the nation's oceans, coastal areas, Great Lakes, and even inland waters.

This announcement comes at the time when the situation supposedly still is "fluid" and the Interagency Ocean Policy Task Force still hasn't issued its final report on zoning uses of these waters.

That's a disappointment, but not really a surprise for fishing industry insiders who have negotiated for months with officials at the Council on Environmental Quality and bureaucrats on the task force. These angling advocates have come to suspect that public input into the process was a charade from the beginning.


Obama's Healthcare Plan 'Makes No sense at all'

Former Massachusetts governor and 2008 Republican presidential candidate Mitt Romney tells Newsmax that America needs to change course or face the “unthinkable consequences” of its decline.

He also asserts that President Obama’s policies have extended and deepened the recession, says his healthcare reform plan “makes no sense at all,” and declares that Sarah Palin is definitely qualified to become president.

Democrats' Poll: 60% Say US on Wrong Track

A new poll on Monday found signs of trouble ahead for President Barack Obama and his Democrats on national security issues such as the handling of terrorism suspects.

The poll was conducted jointly by Democratic Corps, a Democratic organization, and Third Way, a progressive non-profit organization. It was done mainly to gauge voters' views on Democrats' handling of national security.

The poll also found weaknesses for the Democrats on other issues ahead of November elections, in which they hope to defend their strong majorities in Congress.

Activists Tell Obama to Protect Illegals

Immigrant rights groups on Monday demanded that President Obama impose a full moratorium on deportations of illegal immigrants, arguing that his policies have been worse for their cause than those of his Republican predecessor.

Saying they've been "betrayed" by and lost patience with Mr. Obama, the advocates suggested that the president could regain their support by leading a fight on Capitol Hill for a bill to legalize illegal immigrants. Mr. Obama took the first step toward legalization during a meeting Monday at the White House with two lawmakers working on a bill.

Iraq's Remarkable Election
The strategic benefits of an emerging Middle East democracy.

It takes a cynical mind not to share in the achievement of Iraq's national elections. Bombs and missiles, al Qaeda threats and war fatigue failed to deter millions of Iraqis of all sects and regions from exercising a right that is rare in the Arab world. Even the U.N.'s man in Baghdad called the vote "a triumph."

On Sunday, 61% of eligible voters came out in Anbar Province, a former extremist stronghold that includes the towns of Fallujah and Ramadi. In the last national elections five years ago, 3,375 people—or 2%—voted in Anbar. The other Sunni-dominated provinces that boycotted in 2005 saw similar numbers: over 70% turnout in Diyala and Salaheddin and 67% in Nineveh, all higher than the national average of 62%. American Presidential elections rarely have such turnout.

School Reform controversy
Federal testing has narrowed education and charter schools have failed to live up to their promise.

I have been a historian of American education since 1975, when I received my doctorate from Columbia. I have written histories, and I've also written extensively about the need to improve students' knowledge of history, literature, geography, science, civics and foreign languages. So in 1991, when Lamar Alexander and David Kearns invited me to become assistant secretary of education in the administration of George H.W. Bush, I jumped at the chance with the hope that I might promote voluntary state and national standards in these subjects.

By the time I left government service in January 1993, I was an advocate not only for standards but for school choice. I had come to believe that standards and choice could co-exist as they do in the private sector. With my friends Chester Finn Jr. and Joseph Viteritti, I wrote and edited books and articles making the case for charter schools and accountability.


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.”