Our own Quin Hillyer makes a great, but overlooked point on reconciliation. The first move in reconciliation is that the House must pass the Senate version of the bill. Civics 101. Once the House has passed the Senate version of the health care bill, both Houses of Congress have passed the same bill. What do we have then? A signable bill!!!! So if the efforts to “fix” the bill via reconciliation in the Senate fail, it doesn’t matter. Obama can sign health care reform. That’s a Chicago two-step if we’ve ever seen one. So the key to this whole thing is simple: don’t let the House pass the Senate bill. Period. End of Story.

Tonight this will be broadcast in its entirety on PBS. Bob Dylan, along with a number of other performances, were at the White House for a special concert celebrating the music of the Civil Rights Movement. Thank you, President Obama, for this wonderful event!

Three times in the video the President makes reference to a Navy corpse-man. Perhaps the undead are clamoring for bio-equality? Who knew?

Mr. Obama has his opinion; now let him render it.

From the ABC News website (emphasis added):

“The president’s going to explain why he thinks the American people are angry and frustrated,” White House press secretary Robert Gibbs said on “Good Morning America” today.

“Many of the same factors that led Sen. [Scott] Brown to become a senator from Massachusetts led Barack Obama to become president. Now, we’ve got to deal with those angers and frustrations by putting people back to work, by demonstrating we have a plan to get our economy continued on the road to recovery and putting those folks back to work, and protecting our country from those who seek to do us harm.”

Two observations. First, why is that when a liberal idea is rejected it is the consequence of “anger” at the wrong target, but when a conservative idea is rejected it is “speaking truth to power”? Notice, liberal ideas are never rejected for reasons, and conservative ideas are never accepted but for unreason. If you believe this, you are living in denial, for it means that you have insulated yourself from correction and repentance, from the healing of mind and soul. And that’s not a good thing. Second, the President, according to Mr. Gibbs, will tell us this evening what really lurks in the hearts of those that make up the population whose support for his policies is dwindling at an alarming pace. Apparently, the President has some secret knowledge about the inner lives of vast numbers of the American public, insights that are undetectable by we ordinary humans who are limited by our five senses and cognitive faculties. So, if you think you know what you believe about the President’s policies, your self-knowledge may be mistaken. Tonight, thankfully, the President will reveal to us what we really believe.

“He did not need human testimony about them, for he knew what was in their hearts.” – John 2.24

From today’s Slate:

BOSTON—President Obama flew in Sunday for a last-minute campaign stop for beleaguered senatorial candidate Martha Coakley. In his speech, besides the usual exhortations to the party faithful, he managed to work in several snide references to her opponent’s truck as a symbol of false populism. Coakley’s opponent, Republican Scott Brown, was flabbergasted. “Unbelievable,” he said. “The leader of the free world is talking about my truck.“

Read about it here. And while you’re at it, go here and donate to Danny Tarkanian’s campaign for the Nevada U.S. Senate seat. Oh, by the way, here’s Tark’s response to the comments made by Reid:

“A few weeks ago, Harry Reid compared his health care opponents to slavery defenders. Now he’s talking about our President’s ‘light skin’ and ‘negro dialect.’ He disgraces himself almost monthly with some disparaging remark about his constituents, political opponents, or now the President.”

“I notice he’s apologized already for these remarks, but we’re still waiting for his apology to the majority of Nevadans who oppose his health care plan.

“Harry Reid isn’t just America’s most vulnerable Senator – as he demonstrates daily, he’s also its most embarrassing.”

Update: Harry Reid has issued an apology, that includes this gem: “I deeply regret using such a poor choice of words. I sincerely apologize for offending any and all Americans, especially African Americans, for my improper comments.” Apparently, Senator Reid believes it would have been perfectly fine for him to have communicated the same sentiment if his choice of words had not been so impoverished. The impropriety of his comment, then, according to Senator Reid, rests solely on his limited vocabulary rather than what he intended to convey to his listener. Thus, the question that should be posed to the senator is this: How would you have better communicated to your fellows the electoral advantages of Senator Obama’s pale-hued derma and adroit eloquence?

Read about it here. This one-time phenotypical male “recently served as Deputy Director in Advanced Technology Development at Raytheon Missile Systems in Tucson, Ariz.” A trangender missile builder? Only in America. (Freudians, feel free to opine).

He writes at NRO’s the Corner:

When we do know for a fact that Mutallab tried to blow up a plane, we get a presidential “allegedly” (“a passenger allegedly tried to ignite an explosive device on his body, setting off a fire”), and yet when we don’t know all the facts, as in the Professor Gates mess, we get instantaneous certainty (“the Cambridge police acted stupidly in arresting somebody when there was already proof that they were in their own home.”)

The perils of political correctness are especially pernicious when the emperor has no clues.

President Obama was a bit more honest than he, or his speechwriters, intended today.

We just had a very productive session about the final stages of health care reform in the Senate. And from the discussions we had, it’s clear that we are on the precipice of an achievement that’s eluded Congresses and presidents for generations, a achievement that will touch the lives of nearly every American.

The precipice, Mr. President?  How bout we take a few steps back then?

Well, the directive buried last week at the end of the news cycle is coming to light.  Obama is transferring some of the Gitmo detainees to Illinois.  The news accounts have the idiotic spin that this has something to do with job creation:

Obama has faced some resistance to the idea of housing terrorism suspects in the United States, but in Thomson many have welcomed the prospect as a potential economic engine. Thomson Village President Jerry Hebeler, was asleep when the word came that Thomson had been chosen.

“It’s news to me, but then I’m always the last to know anything,” Hebeler said Monday night of the news affecting his town of 450 residents. “It’ll be good for the village and the surrounding area, especially with all the jobs that have been lost here.”

No concern with this town becoming the leading symbol of the operation-formerly-known-as the “War on Terror.”  The Overseas Contingency Operation has gone domestic.

Here is Andrew McCarthy’s response on NRO when the directive came to light last week:

It’s an outrage. It will inevitably result in trained terrorists being released in the United States — bank on it.

Unthinkable?  Funny how what was unthinkable becomes plausible and pragmatic with the passage of time.

If you have a few moments, you owe it to yourself to stop and read President Obama’s Nobel speech and pretend, just for one moment, that it is not coming out of his mouth. It is definitely one of his better speeches, on par, I think, with his 2007 speech on Religion and Public life and his 2008 speech on race. He is thoughtful, measured and cognizant of history. He’s almost, dare I say, realistic. Once and a while, a glimmer of non-ideological thought breaks through his lips. One of the most sobering parts and best is the following passage. It shows that partisan thoughts aside, he might just be beginning to understand the awesome weight of the US Presidency in a way that his two Democratic predecessors did not: (more…)

The Wall Street Journal has a story about obstacles in the way of Democrat plans to tap the unused TARP money for an expansion of their slush funds.  Unfortunately for Dems, TARP was passed back when we thought 700 billion dollars was a significant sum, and the funds are restricted to the purpose of stabilizing the financial system.

Of course, the Democrats are going to give it the old SEIU try.  The Journal’s paragraph describing the President’s appeal is telling:

Much of the president’s presentation will be general and will focus on Washington’s obligation to help Main Street as well as Wall Street. The president is expected to outline ideas for job creation such as aiding cash-strapped state governments, using tax credits to spur home energy-efficiency improvements — the so-called cash-for-caulkers proposal — and offering employers a tax credit for new hiring.

“Ideas for job creation such as aiding cash-strapped state governments”? Yup, that’s always Number 1 on my list of ways to fire up the the engine of American entrepreneurialism.  Let’s make it possible for legislatures and governors in progressive states to maintain their bloated budgets.

As to the third item, why not just deliver a tax cut for small businesses?  Or address the real problem:  the uncertainty over the future costs of Obamacare and Cap and Tax.  No, I think a one-time tax credit that will do nothing toward the future costs of employment should do the trick.

(Warning: Some of this is explicit and nauseating). You can read the disturbingly shocking news here. I’ve already blogged on Mr. Jennings and his favorable opinion and admiration of NAMBLA-supporting Harry Hay. But that’s Amish Sunday School when compared to these recent revelations.

First Things‘ Gateway Pundit reproduces a report published by Scott Baker, co-founder of Brietbart-Tv.com. Here are some excerpts (I placed asterisks in place of letters in profane words, just in case a SA reader was not truly prepared for some of the language):
—-AGAIN: Warning on content—-
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Obama’s choice of West Point for his grand announcement brought to mind one of the greatest speeches ever given beside the Hudson, General Douglas MacArthur’s farewell address in 1962. The contrast could not be more stark: the man whose achievements made him too dangerous to be President and the man whose very lack of discernible achievements elevated him to the office. One whose promises changed the course of history, and one with a history of promising change.

Others will debate the controversial issues, national and international, which divide men’s minds; but serene, calm, aloof, you stand as the Nation’s war-guardian, as its lifeguard from the raging tides of international conflict, as its gladiator in the arena of battle. For a century and a half you have defended, guarded, and protected its hallowed traditions of liberty and freedom, of right and justice.

Let civilian voices argue the merits or demerits of our processes of government; whether our strength is being sapped by deficit financing, indulged in too long, by federal paternalism grown too mighty, by power groups grown too arrogant, by politics grown too corrupt, by crime grown too rampant, by morals grown too low, by taxes grown too high, by extremists grown too violent; whether our personal liberties are as thorough and complete as they should be. These great national problems are not for your professional participation or military solution. Your guidepost stands out like a ten-fold beacon in the night: Duty, Honor, Country.

You are the leaven which binds together the entire fabric of our national system of defense. From your ranks come the great captains who hold the nation’s destiny in their hands the moment the war tocsin sounds. The Long Gray Line has never failed us. Were you to do so, a million ghosts in olive drab, in brown khaki, in blue and gray, would rise from their white crosses thundering those magic words: Duty, Honor, Country.

This report from ABC News is a bit unfair.  Yes, the administration’s report states that 30 jobs have been saved/created in Arizona’s 15th congressional district and … there are only eight districts in Arizona.  However, the reporter fails to note the profound impact that the creation of another seven congressional districts would have on the state’s economy.  That’s in addition to the eight districts saved by the stimulus plan.

Update:  Good news!  Congressman Obey (or Soros will fund a challenger in your primary) has discovered even more job creating potential in correcting the recovery.gov errors:

Rep. David Obey, D-Wisc, who chairs the powerful House appropriations Committee, issued a paper statement demanding that the recovery.gov Web site be updated.

“The inaccuracies on recovery.gov that have come to light are outrageous and the Administration owes itself, the Congress, and every American a commitment to work night and day to correct the ludicrous mistakes.”

“Night and day,” people.  That means two sets of employees.

John Yoo’s piece at The Enterprise Blog on the KSM fiasco, “KSM Trial a Boon to al Qaeda”:

Trying Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in civilian court will be an intelligence bonanza for al Qaeda, tie up our courts for years on issues best left to the president and Congress, and further cripple our intelligence agencies’ efforts to fight terrorists abroad.

KSM and his co-defendants will have all of the benefits and rights that the U.S. Constitution accords those who live here, most importantly the right to demand that the government produce in open court all of the information that it has on them, and how it was obtained.

Arrested spies commonly use this right to get a better deal out of the government, which will want to avoid opening up its intelligence sources and methods on KSM, what information it got from him, and what else it knows about his fellow al Qaeda operatives.

HT Corner

From Powerline:

Yesterday, Obama warned us against jumping to conclusions. Now, as we predicted, it’s pretty clear that Obama has no intention of coming to any conclusions, ever. He ponders the deep mystery of why Malik Nadal Hasan, whom he refers to only as “an Army psychiatrist,” thought it was a good idea to murder American soldiers:

We cannot fully know what leads a man to do such a thing.

There may be some cosmic sense in which that sentence is true; who can ever plumb the depths of the human heart? But we didn’t elect Obama our novelist in chief. He is our commander in chief, and as such his prime responsibility is to protect and the defend the Constitution. And us. We make judgments about other people’s motivations all the time; to take just one obvious example, juries in both civil and criminal cases are frequently required to decide “what leads a man to do such a thing.”

No one can be genuinely shocked that the H1N1 vaccinations aren’t going “according to plan” (a total undersupply of the vaccine) nor should we be shocked at rent-seeking behavior of localities and others receiving doses of the vaccine and then essentially internalizing a benefit to themselves by giving it to people outside of the government-created “priority list.” It does surprise me that it is Wall-Street Bailed-Out companies doing this. (more…)

Whether he deserved to win the Nobel Peace Prize or now, he won it. It will only hurt him.

I think J.R. Dunn at American Thinker is right that it establishes him as the international teacher’s pet:

What the award has done is to mark him permanently as a teacher’s pet, that odious figure from everyone’s school days who was always first in line, always got the highest marks, and always got the prizes whether deserving or not.

However, I think the greatest harm done to Obama by the Norwegians was that in giving him the Peace Prize, they erected a tremendous international monument to many promises that he would rather we all forget.

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Mark Steyn at NRO on Obama’s drift toward abandoning Afghanistan in favor of the domestic agenda:

Obama’s priorities lie not in the Hindu Kush but in America: Why squander your presidency on trying to turn an economically moribund feudal backwater into a functioning nation state when you can turn a functioning nation state into an economically moribund feudal backwater?

You know you’ve got to read the whole thing.  Just keep the laptop handy for halftime.

One story not yet getting play in “Nobelgate” is that the committee that selects the Nobel Peace Prize is based out of Norway—and selected by the Parliament of Norway—but Sweden-based committees formed from the various Swedish academies select all the other prizes. The bottom line? Talking to a few of my relatives this morning who live in Sweden (and these are left-of-center relatives) they together with most of Sweden are livid at Norway for letting such a folly and scandal happen because it lowers the prestige of the Swedish-based awards. My relatives said that in Sweden, Obama’s failure to decline the award has lowered his prestige there because they see it as a “no-brainer” that he should recognize that he has done nothing to merit the award. It really calls into question why exactly they gave Obama the award: Do they think the prize will somehow sway his actions in Iran and Afghanistan? Is it just a slap at eight years of Bush? Or, do they just not think at all?

One additional aside: this blog raises the question as to whether the emoluments clause (Article II, Section 9) requires Congressional authorization in order for a sitting-President to accept the award. For what it is worth, Teddy Roosevelt and Wilson did not get Congressional authorization, but that still doesn’t mean it’s right. One commenter to this post suggests that Congress’s own statutes pre-authorize the reception of this type of gift. Have at it.

President Obama and his supporters face an unprecedented challenge:  how to spin winning the Nobel Peace Prize into a good thing.  Some might say that’s a great problem to have; in a few years, all anyone will remember is the “Nobel Laureate” tag, not the absurdity of the timing. After all, he is following Jimmy Carter in the ‘Anti-Bush’ category and Al Gore among the ‘Gaseous Giant’ winners.

Aye, there’s the rub.  Obama has been effectively Carterized by the committee.  He awoke this morning to find himself on a slow boat to the Happy Isles where the souls of noble failures lie in the timeless bliss of symbolic irrelevance.  The man still has to govern.  The effect will be subtle but unmistakable.  One always takes calls from Elysium with a weary condescension.

In America, we forget that the Midas Touch is a curse, not a blessing.  Midas turns not some things to gold, but everything.  One cannot live on golden food, nor love golden children.  Obama’s gift is to translate whatever he touches to the ethereal, the insubstantial.  He has risen too fast and too far.  He will come to long for the weight of flesh and the heft of more substantial tools.

President Obama wants kids in school more hours per day, more days per year.

“We can no longer afford an academic calendar designed when America was a nation of farmers who needed their children at home plowing the land at the end of each day,” Obama said. “That calendar may have once made sense, but today, it puts us at a competitive disadvantage.”

Please excuse the “un-American” children at 4:22.

(Cross-posted at Underdog Soldier)

Sadly, I can’t claim credit for this one.  I stumbled across this per a friend of a friend of a relation of a loose acquaintance (or something like that) online, but check out the acorns. Maybe I shouldn’t post this. I don’t want to give anyone ideas.

Missourah.com has produced a wonderful aid for all of us still confused about our real motivation for opposing Obama’s various initiatives.  Htip Powerline

President Obama addressed the VFW in the normal liberal attempt to appear as a strong commander-in-chief and a supporter of the military.  We’ve been through the uproars about Bill Clinton’s draft dodging and George W’s National Guard service (memos anyone?), but now we have a commander-in-chief to whom it would never have occurred to serve in the US military.  We have less controversy with a post-Vietnam president, but the contrast with the audience remains stark.

Obama, given the times, had to work in the normal appeal for health care: “’Since there’s been so much misinformation out there about health insurance reform, let me say this: One thing that reform won’t change is veterans’ health care,’ Obama said, drawing a standing ovation from some at the annual convention of Veterans of Foreign Wars.’

No, Mr. President, your reform won’t change veterans’ health care, it will bring the entire American health care system down to the sorry level of the VA hospitals.

(HT to Shawn Floyd)

This following is authored by John David Lewis, a visiting associate professor of politics, philosophy and economics at Duke University. Here is his analysis.
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likely a plant. (It’s one thing to astroturf; it’s quite another to astroturf your kid. Kinda sad). [Update: More info uncovered here. The link uses language that I would not use. So, be forewarned.]

In the Townhall meeting, the President…

1. was dishonest about his views on single-payer.
2. botched his analogy with the post-office and private couriers. (Watch this carefully; he is really struggling to grab on to some conceptual life-raft on which to float).
3. inaccurately claimed that AARP supports his plan.

As I watched I really felt sorry for him. It reminded me of one of those cringe-inducing thesis defenses where you know, and everyone one in the room knows, that the student undergoing the examination is really struggling to defend what he does not deeply know. And you sit watching in embarrassing agony wishing he would find some way to extricate himself from the abyss in which he plummets. Very painful.