Category Archives: Political Commentary

Media Criticism, Political Commentary, War Commentary

Capitulation

5 Comments

I have to agree:

Those in Europe or the Obama administration who advocate suspension say waving ‘preconditions’ shows our flexibility and incentives can bring Iran to the table. But, this process literally has been going on since Klaus Kinkel’s critical dialogue in 1992. During this time, Iran has not made a single concession. The European have made several. So too has Washington. Iran looks at the long-term; we can’t simply restart the clock every time a new administration takes office in Washington, Berlin, Paris, or London.

Obama’s aides are smart. They know the consequence of their actions. It’s hard not to conclude that they have made a policy decision to allow the Islamic Republic of Iran to become a nuclear weapons-capable state.

It is indeed. I guess the plan is to leave it up to Israel (who of course they will condemn after they solve the problem).

Media Criticism, Political Commentary

Talking Turkey

What a difference a president makes. Now staged military photo ops are suddenly awesome.

Despite the NYT’s correction, the meme of “Bush’s plastic turkey proves he sucks and stuff” survives to this day, still popping up occasionally on the Internet and in “reputable” publications all over the world. Just ask the great Tim Blair, who has served as Turkey-Tracker #1 ever since the first outbreak of this particular form of mental illness.

Which brings us to 2009, and a new president who’s on record as saying our troops in Afghanistan are “just air-raiding villages and killing civilians” indiscriminately. A president who opposed the Iraq War and, during his brief, stepping-stone tenure as a senator, voted against the surge. A president who’s even more image-conscious than most (mainly because it’s his one and only qualification for the job), and who’s obviously stung by the rather lukewarm reception he’s received from military audiences in the early days of his presidency.

So, obviously, the solution is to fake it. And once again, actually do what you falsely accuse your political opponents of doing (more leftist projection).

Business, Economics, Political Commentary

The Plan Continues

4 Comments

Jonathan Macey:

To socialize the American economy, it is not necessary to nationalize every business in the United States. All it requires is to put the corporations that control the finances of all of the companies in the economy under government control. And that is what is happening now.

…The initial forceful injection of capital into hundreds of financial institutions…is the first step in an ongoing process to socialize American finance. When this process is complete, every company in the U.S. that needs capital will first have to curry favor with some federal agency or politician. Solid business plans and prospects for growth and profitability will be far less important than diversity plans and political connections.

Apparently, members of Congress liked the special treatment that Connecticut Sen. Chris Dodd received in getting his mortgage through Countrywide.

Tar. Feathers.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary

The End Of The Depression

14 Comments

There was one other anniversary that I forgot to mention yesterday. Sixty-four years ago, Franklin Roosevelt breathed his last, and with his departure from this world, so ended his war on the free market, and the economic depression that he had so nurtured for a dozen long years. It was not mere coincidence that the post-war economic growth was so large — there was no FDR to continue to hinder it with his whimsical and arbitrary tinkering. RIP to both.

Business, Economics, Media Criticism, Political Commentary, Technology and Society

What The Tea Parties Are About

90 Comments

This is both an interesting, and scary graph. The most important thing to me is not just the sheer magnitude of the Obama deficits, but the respective trends of both administrations.

Note that the Bush deficit was decreasing every year until 2008, when it got hammered by the TARP (at least I’m assuming that’s the cause, though it could also be a result of the slowing economy throughout the year, not to mention Congressional spending increases under the Democrats starting in late 2007). Note also that this was happening despite the evil Bush “tax cuts” (which obviously weren’t really tax cuts — they were just tax rate cuts that actually were reducing the deficit, despite the out-of-control spending by the Republican Congress).

In contrast note that the Obama plan is ever-increasing deficits after 2012, whether you believe administration or CBO projections. And though they decrease in the near term, they never get as low as the worst Bush deficit before they start to sky rocket in the teens. This, simply put, is fiscal insanity. And increasing taxes on “the rich” (as they’d surely love to do if they could get away with it) isn’t an option. There simply isn’t enough money there, and if there were, it would tank the economy even more, with even larger deficits from reduced tax receipts and automatic increases in non-discretionary wealth transfers. Also, estimate the integral under the curve. That’s an accumulating debt, with an ever-increasing proportion of the deficit going to interest, particularly when people become reluctant to loan money to a budding Weimar at low rates.

People who will be protesting on Wednesday won’t be protesting against a party. They’ll be protesting against a government completely out of control. But unfortunately for the Democrats and the left, they will be seen as the much larger part of the problem, because the Republicans are now at least giving lip service to reduced spending and reduced government. But they’re going to have to work very hard to live down their spending spree of the “compassionate conservative” (read, “progressive lite”) Bush years.

[Evening update]

“Liberal doughboys afraid of tea parties.”

Liberal bloggers and media groups can’t get the Tea Party phenomenon out of their heads. It wasn’t supposed to be this way, to them. Ordinary people getting together to protest against the liberal establishment. There is a cognitive disconnect. There must be a plot; the vast right-wing conspiracy at work.

So true to form, Media Matters sounded the horn that this was not a real protest, it’s a Fox News segment. Kind of a made for T.V. reality show, with a cast of tens of thousands. Think Progress joined in with “Spontaneous Uprising? Corporate Lobbyists Helping To Orchestrate Radical Anti-Obama Tea Party Protests.”

And the netroot blogosphere heard the call. FireDogLake proprietor Jane Hamsher posted “What Part of ‘FNC TAX DAY TEA PARTIES’ Don’t You Understand?” Hamsher also promoted “citizen-organized protests” which were unlike the “Fox-organized” Tea Parties; I guess she didn’t catch the irony of promoting counter-protests to protest other people promoting protests. Anyway, almost no one showed up for the counter-protests.

Gee, I think I have one of those in comments.

[Monday morning update]

More tea-party panic:

What’s the big deal? ACORN, MoveOn, and Soros get to pull puppet strings year after year, and that’s ok. But God forbid Fox News puts so much as its imprimatur on Tea Parties! No way! That’s too sinister, too insidious; and makes the whole movement illegitimate and inauthentic. Whatever…

Jane Hamsher and Oliver Willis are probably asking “Who the hell are this Tea Party bunch? Where did they come from?” I’ll tell you who they are, Jane and Oliver. They’re your worst nightmare: they’re small-governmenters first and party-loyalists second.

And we’re not laughing with you, Jane and Oliver. We’re laughing at you.

[Bumped]

[Update a few minutes later]

More on Crazy Jane and the other panicked and paranoid leftists (like my commenter):

She’s implying because freedomworks listed the Texas Tea parties and Dick Armey is part of freedomworks that the Tea Parties, Houston in particular, are being organized by “Corporate lobbyists”. Houston Tea Party has never spoken with Freedomworks or Dick Armey, though we do know that Freedomworks has offered legal advice to different Tea parties, we’ve not sought it. None of that should imply they are running the show unless you go to the point of just making stuff up.

The “Corporate lobbyist” line is a laugh. Felicia is a local Mother of two who worked with some local grassroots groups like Raging Elephants. I was someone who was trying to be apolitical the past 4 years until I took a good look at was going on, and I was laid off last week and currently unemployed. There are other organizers and volunteers with us. None of them come close to the description “Corporate Lobbyist”.

And no, this woman is nuts, Fox News is not organizing the Tea Parties, they’re just jumping on board (like a lot of people are trying to). But she’s seeing Dick Armey and Fox News as the boogeymen in the closet…

So… I’ve had my LMAO moment for the day. How about you? 🙂

Edit: More on this silliness:

If we’re being organized by “corporate lobbyists” then where the heck is my check?

Yeah, me too. How do I get in on this hot “corporate lobbyist” action?