World
& National News
Daily
Presidential Tracking Poll
The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Wednesday
shows that 24% of the nation's voters Strongly Approve of the way that
Barack Obama is performing his role as president. Forty-six percent
(46%) Strongly Disapprove, giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index
rating of -22 (see
trends).
This matches the lowest Approval Index rating yet measured for this
president. Platinum Members can see key demographic information and
other members-only information.
Democrats,
Advocacy Groups Blast Cuts to Food Stamps
Some Democrats are upset and advocacy groups are outraged over
the
raiding of the food-stamp cupboard to fund a state-aid bailout that
some call a gift to teachers and government union workers.
House members convened Tuesday and passed the multibillion-dollar
bailout bill for cash-strapped states that provides $10 billion to
school districts to rehire laid-off teachers or ensure that more
teachers won't be let go before the new school year begins, keeping
more than 160,000 teachers on the job, the Obama administration says.
Florida AG
proposes law against illegal immigrants
Florida Attorney General Bill McCollum on Wednesday proposed
legislation that would toughen law enforcement measures against illegal
immigrants in the melting-pot southeastern U.S. state.
The proposal by McCollum, who is engaged in a tough election race as a
Republican candidate for the state governorship, was certain to thrust
Florida into the sensitive immigration debate that has become a hot
political issue ahead of mid-term Congressional elections on November 2.
The legislation would require law enforcement officials to check a
suspected illegal immigrant's status in the course of a stop, or a
violation of another law.
Fed
Looks to Spur Growth by Buying Government Debt
Federal Reserve officials decided to reinvest principal payments on
mortgage holdings into long-term Treasury securities, making their
first attempt to bolster growth since March 2009 to keep the slowing
U.S. economy from relapsing into recession.
“The pace of economic recovery is likely to be more modest in the near
term than had been anticipated,” the Federal Open Market Committee said
in a statement in Washington. “To help support the economic recovery in
a context of price stability, the Committee will keep constant the
Federal Reserve’s holdings of securities at their current level.” The
Fed retained a commitment to keep its benchmark interest rate close to
zero for an “extended period.”
Feds
rethink policies that encourage home ownership
Just how much should Uncle Sam do to help Americans buy their own homes?
For 70 years — and for the last 15 in particular — the answer has been:
Whatever it takes.
Now, policymakers are pausing to reconsider. In the next few months,
they'll weigh whether there can be too much of a good thing when it
comes to helping families finance the American Dream.
The rethink could mean a shake-up for a mortgage market addicted to
government subsidies.
Alaska
rescuers had to cut out 3 survivors from plane
Ex-NASA chief critical
after crash; former senator among 5 who perished
Rescuers arriving at the scene of the Alaska plane crash had to cut a
large hole in the side of the plane in order to save three of the four
surviving passengers, the first two National Guardsmen to respond to
the accident said Wednesday.
The fourth survivor was found under the wing, attempting to stay dry in
the wet conditions, Sr. Master Sgt. Jonathan Davis said.
Primary
winners highlight political inexperience
All hail inexperience — the less familiarity with politics the better,
no matter the party or state.
"The support of the voters of Connecticut isn't bestowed by the
establishment or the pundits or the media. It isn't a birthright,"
former World Wrestling Entertainment executive Linda McMahon said after
winning the GOP senatorial nomination in her first run for office.
Two mountain ranges away, appointed Sen. Michael Bennett of Colorado,
tried to express the same sentiment after dispatching his rival, a
former state house speaker. "This election is the first time my name
has ever been on the ballot," said Bennett, who enjoyed President
Barrack Obama's support in the bitter Democratic primary.
Can
Republicans Take Over the Senate?
It's an unlikely possibility, one that's been largely ignored as
chances of a House takeover have dominated midterm discussion, but it's
a long-shot possibility nonetheless.
Under perfect circumstances of Republicans winning most of the
competitive races this cycle, it could happen. According to current
polls, Republicans are poised to pick up seats in North Dakota,
Indiana, Arkansas, and Delaware, where GOP candidates lead by double
digits in polls. In New Hampshire, the Republican candidate leads by
eight percentage points. Democrats are engaged in close races to defend
seats in Washington, Nevada, California, Illinois, Pennsylvania,
Wisconsin, and Colorado. If Republicans win all those races, it would
net them 12 seats. Should Linda McMahon use her vast personal wealth to
pull off an upset in Connecticut, Republicans would take over 13
Democratic-held seats.
Rangel's
Defiant Speech Stuns Democratic Leaders
Embattled long-time Rep. Charlie Rangel shocked Democratic leaders by
taking to the House floor Tuesday afternoon to deliver an impassioned
harangue from the floor of the House in defense of his decision to
fight ethics allegations leveled against him.
His diatribe, which could hardly come at a worse time for Democrats
facing disenchanted voters in the November midterms, ranged from
defiant to apologetic. Rangel painted himself as a victim because the
House Ethics committee has not yet informed him when his ethics case
will be heard, he said.
Arizona
Sheriffs Call ICE Honcho Visit a 'Stunt'
Two key sheriffs along the Arizona-Mexico border on Tuesday called a
planned visit by U.S. Immigration and Customs Enforcement Assistant
Secretary John Morton a "political stunt" and described as "pathetic"
Obama administration attempts to "cover up its inaction in protecting
our borders."
"The administration blew past their promised Aug. 1 deadline to send
524 National Guard troops to Arizona, and now they are trying to appear
concerned by sending the ICE director, who recently received a vote of
'no confidence' by ICE's union," Arizona Sheriffs Paul Babeu of Pinal
County and Larry Dever of Cochise County said in a tersely worded
statement.
The
Obsolescence of Barack Obama
The magic of 2008 can't be recreated,
and good riddance to it.
Not long ago Barack Obama, for those who were spellbound by him, had
the stylishness of JFK and the historic mission of FDR riding to the
nation's rescue. Now it is to Lyndon B. Johnson's unhappy presidency
that Democratic strategist Robert Shrum compares the stewardship of Mr.
Obama. Johnson, wrote Mr. Shrum in the Week magazine last month, never
"sustained an emotional link with the American people" and chose to
escalate a war that "forced his abdication as president."
A broken link with the public, and a war in Afghanistan he neither
embraces and sells to his party nor abandons—this is a time of
puzzlement for President Obama. His fall from political grace has been
as swift as his rise a handful of years ago. He had been hot political
property in 2006 and, of course, in 2008. But now he will campaign for
his party's 2010 candidates from afar, holding fund raisers but not
hitting the campaign trail in most of the contested races. Those mass
rallies of Obama frenzy are surely of the past.
Stimulus
Pushers
The latest bailout for
public unions and spendthrift states.
To treat Washington's spending addiction, the November elections are
the taxpayer's best chance to stage an intervention. But until then,
President Obama and the Democratic Congress are determined to keep
pushing strung-out state governments to take one more fix.
Witness yesterday's 247-161 largely party-line House vote to approve a
Senate bill shovelling another $26.1 billion out to state education and
Medicaid programs. The White House has promoted the bill as emergency
assistance for strained state budgets. But this unique brand of therapy
drives states to spend more, not less. The "assistance" is so expensive
that several governors were begging for relief even before Mr. Obama
signed it into law.
Disorder
By Geoff
Metcalf
"In
its
narrowest
acceptation,
order
means obedience. A government is said
to preserve order if it succeeds in getting itself obeyed."
--
John
Stuart
Mill
I have tried and failed to give our young hope and change President the
chance to demonstrate by action that those of us who had been critical
of his lack of experience, hypocrisy and duplicity might have been
wrong. The republic needs help and what is right and wrong should
overshadow who is right or wrong.
However, this president seems intent on establishing new standards for
incompetence, failure and even the barest minimal capacity to judge the
climate, strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats his actions
(and inaction) precipitate.
Conventional wisdom would suggest that statistically, the
administration might be right more based on pure chance
probability?
Not even! Even the liberal punditry class is wishing Hillary had
prevailed.
Nobel laureate Isidor Issac Rabi once observed, "Most new insights come
only after a superabundant accumulation of facts have removed the
blindness which prevented us from seeing what later comes to be
regarded as obvious." Hell-o?!?!?
Barack Obama is failing epically. Even the brayed about Obamacare
victory (?) has supporters seeking cover. Woodrow Wilson was a
flop as
president largely because he allowed the oligarchy to do what they
wanted to do. And look what it got us…the Federal Reserve Act of 1913,
the 16th Amendment and systemic Big Brotherism.
Jimmy Carter failed without help from the CFR magus…his monumental
failures were largely his own. LBJ failed…but at least was slick enough
to craft his own exit strategy. Richard Nixon was Richard Nixon
and
although he has become a stereotype for all things venial and wrong, he
still gets kudos for statesmanlike props because of China (which yet
may come back to bite us in the bottom).
Barack Obama however, is a horse in another garage…a new standard to
overshadow all previous failures. The Obama failures are not isolated
or focused…no; they are routine, ubiquitous, and the new standards.
The President's job performance has been not just bad but way bad:
foreign policy, domestic initiatives, (no one could have forcast our
first Black president's awful ham handedness in turning minor racial
issues into such a monumental SNAFU) and most importantly, in forging
connections with the American people (for whom he appears to show open
distain)
.
Cicero noted, “A nation can survive its fools, and even the ambitious.
But it cannot survive treason from within. An enemy at the gates is
less formidable, for he is known and carries his banner openly. But the
traitor moves amongst those within the gate freely, his sly whispers
rustling through the alleys, heard in the very halls of government
itself. For the traitor appears not a traitor, he speaks in
accents
familiar to his victims, and he wears their face and their arguments,
he appeals to the baseness that lies deep in the hearts of all
men. He
rots the soul of a nation, he works secretly and unknown in the night
to undermine the pillars of the city, he infects the body politics so
that it can no longer resist. A murder is less to fear. The
traitor
is the plague.”
The Wall Street Journal said Obama is failing because "he has no
understanding of the American people". Some say he just flat out
doesn’t like the American people he is supposed to serve.
Fred Barnes of the Weekly Standard says Obama is failing because he has
"lost control of his message", and is overexposed. However, the
systemic problem from the jump was the message was form without
substance…it was a catch phrase without a plot. Beyond winning the
election, Obama really had no strategy and no tactics.
Clarice Feldman of American Thinker dared to say what needed to be
said...not just that the emperor has no clothes but, “Obama is failing
because fundamentally he is neither smart nor articulate; his
intellectual dishonesty is conspicuous by its audacity and lack of
shame.”
The real villain in the contemporary American tragedy is not really
Barack Obama, or even his liberal socialist masters. Justice Hugo
Black once wrote, "The Press was protected so that it could bare the
secrets the government and inform the people. Only a free and
unrestrained press can effectively expose deception in government. And
paramount among the responsibilities of a free press is the duty to
prevent any part of the government from deceiving the people."
However, we now have a press that has epically failed in its
responsibilities “to prevent any part of government from deceiving the
people.”
The main stream media has become a willing and hyper-active
co-conspirator enabling an incompetent dysfunctional administration
that has done (and continues to do) irreparable harm to the republic.