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APRIL 9,  2011

MADNESS ON A SATURDAY NIGHT – AT 11:56 P.M. ET:   Have you recently asked, "Who is teaching our children?"  Maybe you'd better start asking.  This, from NewsBusters:

Seattle, Washington sounds like a town competing for the most ACLU-friendly city in America. A public school teacher there told a teenage volunteer she could hand out Easter eggs with candy....as long as she called them "Spring Spheres."

Jessica, 16, told KIRO Radio's Dori Monson Show that a week before spring break, the students commit to a week-long community service project. She decided to volunteer in a third grade class at a public school, which she would like to remain nameless.

"At the end of the week I had an idea to fill little plastic eggs with treats and jelly beans and other candy, but I was kind of unsure how the teacher would feel about that," Jessica said. She was concerned how the teacher might react to the eggs after of a meeting earlier in the week where she learned about "their abstract behavior rules."

"I went to the teacher to get her approval and she wanted to ask the administration to see if it was okay," Jessica explained. "She said that I could do it as long as I called this treat 'spring spheres.' I couldn't call them Easter eggs."

Rather than question the decision, Jessica opted to "roll with it." But the third graders had other ideas.

"When I took them out of the bag, the teacher said, 'Oh look, spring spheres' and all the kids were like 'Wow, Easter eggs.' So they knew," Jessica said.

COMMENT:  And remember next December to put up your Chilly Weather Tree as you prepare to greet Mr. All-Cultures Claus and his solar-powered sled.  Be sure to treat the reindeer equally and with respect for their different narrative about life.

Geez.

April 9, 2011     Permalink

SYRIA FIGHTING CONTINUES – AT 12:39 P.M. ET:  The fact that clashes within Syria between government forces and demonstrators have gone on so long indicates that the grip of the Assad family on power in the country may be loosening.  More violence today in Iran's closest Arab ally:

BEIRUT, Lebanon (AP) — Syrian security forces fired on protesters in the cities of Latakia and Dara on Saturday, a day after the bloodiest and largest antigovernment protests since the uprising began.

In the port city of Latakia, security forces fired live ammunition to break up a sit-in early Saturday.

Residents reported hearing hours of heavy gunfire overnight as security forces dispersed hundreds of protesters.

“The shooting went on for almost two hours,” said one resident, speaking on the condition of anonymity for fear of reprisals. “It was frightening.”

There was no immediate word on casualties.

And...

Later Saturday, security forces fired on protesters during a funeral in Dara, a volatile southern city where at least 25 people were killed on Friday, a Syrian human rights advocate said.

The advocate, Ammar Qurabi, who leads Syria’s National Organization for Human Rights, said the group’s information was coming from residents and witnesses in Dara. He said several people were wounded Saturday as burials were taking place.

COMMENT:  Syria, Egypt, Libya, Yemen, Tunisia, Jordan, Bahrain.  It is extraordinary to see the eruptions in so many Arab countries at the same time. 

Also, there are renewed clashes between Israel and the Hamas forces in the Gaza Strip.  Some observers are predicting a major escalation, with the potential for a major war this summer. 

And what is American policy?  I'm not sure anyone has figured it out, and the secretary of state has been remarkably quiet in recent days.

The whole region could explode.  If you think four-dollar gas is high...

April 9, 2011       Permalink

THE FINE PRINT – AT 10:37 A.M. ET:  While there is much relief in Washington, it may be short-lived, as the fine print of the budget deal is published.  Michele Bachmann, for one, isn't pleased.  She points out, correctly, that the cuts in spending are minimal, and far from enough to make a big difference.  From The Politico:

“The deal that was reached tonight is a disappointment for me and for millions of Americans who expected $100 billion in cuts, who wanted to make sure their tax dollars stopped flowing to the nation’s largest abortion provider, and who wanted us to defund ObamaCare," Bachmann said in a release. "Instead, we’ve been asked to settle for $39 billion in cuts, even as we continue to fund Planned Parenthood and the implementation of ObamaCare. Sadly, we’re missing the mandate given us by voters last November, and for that reason I voted against the Continuing Resolution.”

COMMENT:  There obviously will be disagreement on where cuts should be made, but Bachmann is fundamentally correct.  The real hero of the week was Representative Paul Ryan of Wisconsin, who unveiled a Republican budget that would dramatically reduce government spending over ten years, and, yes, would inflict some pain.  Naturally, the budget is already under attack as anti-people, anti-children and anti-pet dogs. 

The budget deal reached last night is, to quote Churchill, not the end, not the beginning of the end, but it is the end of the beginning.  We are just getting started in putting our fiscal house back in order, and success, given the special interest involved, is far from assured.

April 9, 2011      Permalink

THE GOVERNMENT STANDS – AT 10:10 A.M. ET:  The government was not shut down last night thanks to a last- minute deal made by congressional Dems and Republicans, with the White House involved.  Thus, we will continue to enjoy the same efficiency, quality and dynamic leadership that we're used to.  The sound you hear is me choking. 

Now, who get the credit for the last-minute deal and the spending cuts it contains?   Well, if you ask President Obama, he gets the credit.  He spoke last night as if he'd wanted spending cuts all along.  This is pretty unbelievable:

"Like any worthwhile compromise, both sides had to make tough decisions and give ground on issues that were important to them," Obama said before cameras in the White House Blue Room as he acknowledged some of the cuts agreed to would be painful, with certain programs cut back and other projects encountering delays. "But beginning to live within our means is the only way to protect those investments that will help America compete for new jobs," he said.

COMMENT:  Huh?  The only way?  Did he really say that, or is this a bad dream?  When has this president ever emphasized living within our means?   The government's deficit this year is $1.5-trillion, and I haven't seen one member of the Obama White House faint at the number. 

But this is a president who claimed that his election meant that the oceans would recede, so his sudden conversion to fiscal discipline, which might last as long as a day, should come as no surprise.

April 9, 2011       Permalink

NEW VIOLENCE IN EGYPT – AT 10:01 A.M. ET:  Just when we thought Nicholas Kristof of The New York Times had this one put away and wrapped up as a victory for the common man, reality intervenes.  How unfair:

Egyptian soldiers armed with clubs and rifles have stormed Cairo's Tahrir Square in a pre-dawn raid that reportedly killed at least two people, reigniting the simmering tensions in the country.

Video footage showed hundreds of troops firing weapons and charging in large numbers into the square to clear it.

Tahrir Square – which for 18 days was the centre of the Egyptian revolution that ousted President Hosni Mubarak — was occupied again on Friday by hundreds of thousands of Egyptians calling for Mubarak to be put on trial, and for the head of the army, Field Marshal Mohammed Hussein Tantawi, who is the titular head of state, to be removed.

Many demonstrators were demanding that the army council be replaced by a civilian one during a transitional period to democracy, accusing the military of protecting members of the former regime.

The huge turnout followed growing fears that the revolution had been hijacked by the army.

Witnesses in the square said the raid was led by a mixture of army, police and internal security forces. About 300 soldiers swept into the square at around 3am, backed by 20-30 military trucks. Witnesses said firing continued in the square until around 5.30am on Saturday.

COMMENT:  Egypt is the most important Arab nation, culturally.  We cheered the revolution, but, like many revolutions, the reality may not be that pretty.

In addition to this story of renewed violence, there are new reports of Islamist groups making their move before the fall elections.  They may not win outright, but will exert far more influence in Egypt than they did under Mubarak.

What will the Egyptian people gain?  Maybe we should also ask what they will lose.  So far, the signs aren't brilliant, and the peace between Egypt and Israel, a key ingredient of American foreign policy in the region, seems more fragile than ever. 

Viva the revolution.  Yeah.

April 9, 2011     Permalink

APRIL 8,  2011

BULLETIN:  BUDGET DEAL REACHED – AT 11:21 P.M. ET:  As expected by everyone who has ever seen a state or local labor negotiation, a deal was reachd just before the midnight deadline to fund the federal government for the next five months.  Notice the difference?  From WaPo:

Republicans and Democrats on Capitol Hill have reached an agreement that would avert a federal government shutdown, yielding more spending cuts for Republicans while giving Democrats a key win on an issue related to abortion rights, Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid’s office announced Friday night.

The deal to fund the federal government for the next five months will include $39 billion in spending cuts and will drop language related to Planned Parenthood. Lawmakers still need to approve a short-term stopgap funding bill before midnight, when the federal government will run out of money and cease operations.

COMMENT:  We don't have any real details just yet.  The spending cuts are pretty minimal, considering the size of the annual deficit and the national debt.  We'll have to do far better than this to avoid a national economic catastrophe.

April 8, 2011      Permalink

ERUPTION IN SYRIA – AT 8:45 P.M. ET:  Syria is far more important in the Middle East than is Libya.  Syria is simmering.  The government doesn't hesitate to shoot its own citizens in the streets, while the world reacts with remarkable indifference.   I guess some people just have pull.  From London's Telegraph:

Supporters of Syria's president Bashir al-Asad opened fire during fresh protests on Friday killing at least 22 people, as tentative government concessions showed no signs of winning over the opposition.

Witnesses said the worst clashes began after demonstrators marched from three mosques in the southern city of Deraa after Friday prayers.

Security forces in plain clothes fired tear gas then rubber bullets and finally live ammunition on stone-throwing youths. At least 17 people were reported killed.

There were protests in cities across Syria sparking violent responses from the authorities. Three people were killed in the town of Harasta, two in Homs and, significantly, there was a report that water cannon had been used to put down a demonstration in Hama, the town where Mr Asad's father and predecessor, Hafez al-Asad, killed 20,000 people in putting down an Islamist uprising in 1982.

COMMENT:  Yes, that was 20,000.  Do you recall any outrage?  I don't.  There was apparently nothing in it for the political left, and its cronies in the press, so Hama passed without too much notice, just like Rwanda, Cambodia, and other names now associated with horror.  The left is very selective, you know.

Our attention has been spread so thin, with new things popping up every day, that we risk forgetting the constant violence in the Mideast, and the challenges to the governments now in place.  The fact remains that we don't know much about the opposition, the rebels, and we can wind up in worse shape than we are now, especially as our role in Libya has made us look like a paper tiger, although it is recycled paper.

The Syrian violence is increasing.  And there was further violence in Yemen today.  And Egyptian demonstrators also appeared in Cairo, demanding that the promise of their revolution be kept.

I'd love to know how some of those "Mideast studies" professors in our universities, who've been telling us all these years that we and the Israelis were to blame for all the suffering in the world, are handling the situation.  I'll bet they're not changing a word in a single lecture.

April 8, 2011      Permalink

NO DEAL YET – AT 8:20 P.M. ET:  We are less than four hours away from a potential government shutdown, with dire warnings from the Dems that all worthy people will DIE right after midnight, and women will DIE even more, unless an agreement satisfactory to the left is arrived at.

Republicans are keeping cool in the face of unbelievable smears and wild-eyed exaggerations.  Democratic Representative Louise Slaughter (an appropriate name) of New York solemnly announced today that Republicans were elected to Congress in 2010 to kill women.  Yes, as I recall, that was part of the GOP platform last year. 

And, of course, Jesse Jackson, striving to get back the spotlight stolen by Barack Obama, has announced that the budget battle is just like the Civil War.  No doubt Ken Burns will make a miniseries about this, too.  I can't wait for the theme music. 

And Nancy Pelosi, last year's queen of the May, or May Day queen, or whatever it is?  She was in Boston giving a speech today.  I think Congress should dock her salary for taking an excursion with a government shutdown only hours away.  But who are we to question her cultural priorities, and Boston is so dear to the liberal left.

We'll keep watching, and I'm guessing they'll have a deal, whereupon the president will take the credit.  And the press will give it to him.

April 8, 2011     Permalink

THE RACIAL DIVIDE – AT 9:12 A.M. ET:  It's no secret that we're a divided nation politically, and in other respects.  But the racial divide in politics is severe.  It is joined by a class, gender and education divide.

There's been, in effect, a role reversal in American politics.   Working-class whites, once the backbone of the Democratic Party, are moving right, in line with their values and hard-work ethic.  More educated white women, but not educated white men, are for Obama.  In a way, this follows what we've seen in American society:  The colleges propagandize their students, and especially white women, to reject traditional American values.  From National Journal:

Obama's best group in the white electorate remains well-educated women, who tend toward more liberal positions on social issues as well as greater receptivity to government activism. In the new poll, 56 percent of college-educated white women said they approved of Obama's performance. That's a slight improvement from the 52 percent of such women who voted for him in 2008, according to the Edison Research exit poll. It's also a big improvement from the 43 percent of college-plus white women who backed Democratic House candidates in 2010. (Well-educated white women provided substantially more support for Democrats in some key 2010 Senate races, including contests in Colorado, California and Wisconsin.)

The rest of the white electorate remains deeply cool to Obama, the Pew survey found. Just 38 percent of college-educated white men said they approve of the president. That's down from the 42 percent of the vote he won from those men in 2008, and only a slight improvement from the miniscule 35 percent House Democrats won with them in 2010.

Obama's approval rating in the Pew survey stood at just 34 percent among white women without a college education-the so-called waitress moms. Democrats have often had high hopes for capturing those economically-strained, culturally-conservative women, but the new result only underscores their consistent Republican tilt: Obama won just 41 percent of them in 2008, and House Democrats just 34 percent of them in 2010.

The toughest group for Obama remains white men without a college-education-the blue-collar workers who constituted the foundation of the Democratic electoral coalition from 1932 to 1968. Just 35 percent of them said they approve of his performance in the Pew poll. That's below even the 39 percent of them Obama carried in 2008, though slightly above the Democrats' microscopic 32 percent showing with them in 2010, according to the exit poll. All of these results suggest that the gap between Obama's support among college-educated white women and non-college white men-which stood at a formidable 13 percentage points in 2008-might easily widen even further in 2012.

COMMENT:  It's very sad to see what we're seeing.  It is, of course, a dream of the left to divide America along racial and ethnic grounds, and even gender grounds.  "Race, gender and ethnicity" is the mantra of the left. 

But I wonder how the "progressives" explain the loss of the working class.  Why, isn't this what "progressivism" is all about?  I always thought it was.  Maybe, like Rick in "Casablanca," I was misinformed.

April 8, 2011      Permalink

A REAL QUAGMIRE – AT 8:51 A.M. ET:  The word "quagmire" is overused in news discussions.  But there appears to be a real quagmire developing in Libya, thanks in no small measure to the incoherence of our dear leader's foreign policy.

TRIPOLI (Reuters) - Libyan government forces tried to storm into the besieged city of Misrata on Friday as NATO generals acknowledged their air power was not enough to help insurgents remove Muammar Gaddafi by force alone.

Misrata, a lone rebel outpost in the west of the country, has been under siege by Gaddafi's forces for weeks. On Friday insurgents said government troops were advancing into eastern districts and fighting street battles with rebels.

"They tried to advance and enter the city from the eastern side, from an area called Eqseer which is a populated area. The rebels confronted them and clashes are continuing," insurgent spokesman Hassan al-Misrati told Reuters.

The only active front in the war, along the Mediterranean coast around the eastern cities of Brega and Ajdabiyah, has descended into stalemate for a week with both sides making advances and then retreating behind secure lines at night.

COMMENT:  Our attention span is not long.  People are starting to forget Libya, as they forgot Afghanistan a long while ago.  The word "victory" is foreign to Obama, and his failure to articulate a victory strategy, and then fund it, is leading us into a mess.  It will be blamed on BUSH (!!).

April 8, 2011     Permalink

FROM THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF BERKELEY – AT 8:09 A.M. ET:  The Washington Examiner reports that "progressive" Democrats in the House are about to release their own "budget," one that exists somewhere between Disney World and the land of Oz.  Naturally, it's called "the people's budget."  Everything on the left is always "the people's," until it's not.  

The progressives’ alternative, dubbed “The People’s Budget,” promises to reduce the debt and return the nation to surpluses with a combination of massive tax increases and defense cuts. I believe that the proposals outlined below would do tremendous harm to national security and the economy. Its goal for revenue as a percentage of the economy – 22.3 percent – would represent the highest rate of taxation in American history (see PDF). While that sort of revenue model may work on paper, in reality, given the economic disincentives it creates as well as the likelihood of increased tax avoidance, it would ultimately be fiscally unworkable.

Now, here is an extract from the "progressive" budget memo, dealing with defense cuts:

Defense savings

1. End overseas contingency operations emergency supplementals starting in 2013, providing $170 billion in FY2012 funding for withdrawal

2. Reduce baseline Defense spending by reducing strategic capabilities, conventional forces, procurement, and R&D programs

COMMENT:  You know, for years I've been saying that the "progressive" Democrats don't even believe in national defense, and I think that extract proves it.  They want to end "overseas contingency operations" budgets, meaning, essentially, no major anti-terror operations overseas.  Oh, I should explain:  On the progressive left, anti-terror actions are called "overseas contingency operations."

And get point 2:  The "progressives" actually use the term "reducing strategic capabilities."  In other words, they want to reduce our ability to defend ourselves, and aren't ashamed to say so.  They really believe most of the problems in the world are our fault, and that we must cleanse ourselves by withdrawing.  These are the same activists – and the same kind of activists – who whined about "the people of Vietnam" during the Vietnam War, then turned their backs during the Cambodian genocide. 

I don't think a "progressive" budget has much of a chance to get through, unless the GOP totally collapses in 2012.  But it's interesting to see what that crowd, much of it led by the California Democratic delegation, really believes.

April 8, 2011      Permalink

NO GOVERNMENT TOMORROW? – AT 7:51 A.M. ET:  It's high noon in Washington.  Either there's a budget deal today or the government shuts down tonight.  If there's a shutdown, you may be sure the Obamans will make it as painful as possible for the average American, then say, "You see, you elected Republicans and this is what you got."  And it will be effective.

But there are intense negotiations in progress.  No white smoke yet, but there may be a deal in the works.  From Fox:

Lawmakers worked through the night Thursday to try to reach a budget deal, but with no word on their progress, it was unclear whether or not there would be an announcement in the morning that a federal shutdown had been avoided.

And with a shutdown possible as early as midnight at the end of Friday, time is almost up.

Following another high-stakes meeting with congressional leaders Thursday evening, President Obama said he expected an answer early Friday on whether or not an agreement had been reached.

"Because the machinery of the shutdown is starting to move, I expect an answer in the morning," Obama said in the White House briefing room after the meeting with House Speaker John Boehner and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid. "And my hope is that I'll be able to announce to the American people sometime relatively early in the day that a shutdown has been averted."

COMMENT:   This is one of these down-to-the-wire situations where the public loses interest in the details and just wants a deal.  We see it in labor negotiations between public-service unions and state and local governments all the time.  In New York, those representing transit workers are real artists at this.  No deal, no trains and buses.  Deal, you may be pinched for higher fares, but the convenience is better than losing your paychecks.  Works every time, which is one reason state and local governments have these wild pension plans for their employees.

April 8, 2011     Permalink