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MAY 1,  2011

OBAMA CONFIRMS BIN LADEN DEATH – AT 11:56 P.M. ET:  President Obama delivered an effective and disciplined speech a few minutes ago confirming that an American team operating in Pakistan killed Osama bin Laden today.  (Or, as some in the president's base might put it, Osama bin Laden's civil liberties were seriously violated by culturally insensitive members of America's industrial-military complex.  Demonstrations tomorrow.)

The president's speech did not go into much detail.   There was only one curious statement – that there was a firefight, and that bin Laden was killed after the firefight.  We'll want to know more about the timeline. 

Americans are understandably rejoicing at the news that the mastermind of 9-11 is now dead.  Obama made only one reference to President Bush in his statement – recalling Bush's admonition after the 9-11 attacks that we were not at war with Islam.  In my view Mr. Obama should have shared credit with Mr. Bush, but that has never been his style.

It is too soon to make any accurate assessment of the political implications of this major news.  The election is a year and a half away, but this won't hurt Obama's national-security credentials.  You may be sure that his handlers will bill him as the man who got bin Laden.

More in the morning.

May 1, 2011       Permalink

BULLETIN – AT 11:14 P.M. ET:  All major news organizations are reporting that Osama bin Laden is dead, and that he was killed by American action in Pakistan.  The United States reportedly has the body.  We are awaiting a statement from the president.

Obviously, this will be a major event.  We withhold comment until more facts are in and the presidential statement made.

May 1, 2011      Permalink

WANT ADS POSTED – AT 11:31 A.M. ET:  The New York Times reports that Republican operatives are encouraging more candidates to get into the presidential race, a reflection of the belief, accurate or not, that the current field doesn't inspire excitement. 

MANCHESTER, N.H. — Republican leaders, activists and donors, anxious that the party’s initial presidential field could squander a chance to capture grass-roots energy and build a strong case against President Obama at the outset of the 2012 race, are stepping up appeals for additional candidates to jump in, starting with Gov. Mitch Daniels of Indiana.

“I’m getting letters from all over the damn country, and some of them are pretty moving,” Mr. Daniels said in an interview last week at the Capitol in Indianapolis, where his friends believe he is inching closer to exploring a candidacy. He added, “It can’t help but affect you.”

The first contests of the primary are about eight months away, and most of the candidates have yet to fully open their campaigns. But some party leaders worry that Republicans are making a bad first impression by appearing tentative about their prospects against Mr. Obama and allowing Donald J. Trump to grab headlines in the news vacuum of the race’s early stages.

“The race needs more responsible adults who can actually do the job,” said Fergus Cullen, a former chairman of the New Hampshire Republican Party.

Former Gov. Mike Huckabee of Arkansas, who leads many polls despite taking few steps to organize a campaign, is quietly asking supporters to be patient. And Jon M. Huntsman Jr., a former governor of Utah and a relative moderate in a party that has moved to the right, has just returned from his post as ambassador to China to decide whether to join a campaign-in-waiting built by Republicans who see an opening for him.

The wish list among Republicans is wide and varied. Sarah Palin, a former governor of Alaska, retains a devoted following. But activists also express a longing for others to step off the sidelines, including Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, Gov. Rick Perry of Texas and Representative Paul D. Ryan of Wisconsin, the chairman of the Budget Committee.

COMMENT:  Republican anxiety is a reflection of three things:  First, Obama, a mediocre president, is a superb candidate, and great salesmen can often sell a weak product.  Second, the Republican Party itself is not very popular, and a charismatic candidate is needed.  Third, Republican pros understand that the media will be deep in the tank for Obama, even deeper than in 2008, and a Republican candidate will have to speak over the heads of the journalists and directly to the American people, as Reagan did artfully.

Marco Rubio has just ruled himself out, once again, for a place on the national ticket.  That, however, can be reversed later on, with no penalty.  He is one of the few potentials who has a compelling personality. 

Mitch Daniels, a superb governor of Indiana, appears to be the flavor of the month, and he has indicated that he will decide in the next few weeks whether to run.  His selling point is his record.   But he is vulnerable to charges that he is too narrowly focused on budgetary matters and has difficulty holding an audience for more than a few minutes.  Intriguing guy, though.

We'll be watching the initial field on May 5th, this week, in the campaign's first public debate.  Now it all begins.

May 1, 2011       Permalink

WELL DESERVED – AT 10:48 A.M. ET:  The late Pope John Paul II moved a step closer to sainthood today in a moving Vatican ceremony:

VATICAN CITY — Pope Benedict XVI beatified Pope John Paul II before 1.5 million faithful in St. Peter’s Square and surrounding streets Sunday, moving the beloved former pontiff one step closer to possible sainthood in one of the largest turnouts ever for a Vatican Mass.

The crowd in Rome and in capitals around the world erupted in cheers, tears and applause as an enormous photo of a young, smiling John Paul was unveiled over the loggia of St. Peter’s Basilica and a choir launched into hymn long associated with the Polish-born pope.

“He restored to Christianity its true face as a religion of hope,” Benedict said in his homily, referring to John Paul’s decisive role in helping bring down communism. Benedict dotted his remarks with personal recollections of a man he came to “revere” during their near-quarter century working together.

Beatification is the first major milestone on the path to possible sainthood, one of the Catholic Church’s highest honors. A second miracle attributed to John Paul’s intercession is needed for him to be canonized.

COMMENT:  I am not an expert on the Catholic religion, and would never attempt to make religious judgments.  However, if ever there was a man who deserved honor it is John Paul II.  He was one of that great triumvirate, along with Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher, who brought Communism to its knees in Europe. 

Isn't it interesting, though, that John Paul II was never awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for the dramatic impact he had.  Neither, of course, was Ronald Reagan or Prime Minister Thatcher.   The fraudulent Norwegian leftists wouldn't have it.  Instead they awarded their "peace" prize to Mikhail Gorbachev, certified Marxist, whose only contribution was realizing that his country was cooked.  The prize, of course, has also gone to Jimmy Carter, Al Gore, and, after three days in office, Barack Obama.

The Vatican ceremony is vastly more important than the Nobel Peace Prize, which should be placed in retirement.  It is a fake and an obscenity, a joke on humankind by minor-league European politicians with a cultural death wish.

We recall John Paul II today.  And Ronald Reagan.  And Lady Thatcher, who is still with us.  Their great prize is their legacy, far greater than a plaque and a check.

May 1, 2011     Permalink

LIBYA UPDATE – AT 10:35 A.M. ET:  We are following the report that Gaddafi's son and three grandchildren were killed yesterday in a NATO air raid.  There still is no confirmation, and Western countries are not accepting the report at face value, a wise decision considering that the source is the Libyan regime.  From Reuters:

Britain cannot confirm reports that a son of Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi was killed in a NATO air strike, junior Foreign Office minister Alistair Burt said on Sunday. "We've no verification of that at the moment. These are still unconfirmed reports. I'm afraid we don't know one way or the other," Burt told Sky News when asked about a Libyan government statement that a NATO air strike in Tripoli had killed Gaddafi's youngest son and three grandchildren.

Burt said command and control centers were "often placed in civilian areas by forces overseas".

A Libyan government spokesman said on Saturday that Gaddafi survived a NATO air strike that killed his youngest son and three grandchildren and destroyed a Tripoli house.

"What we have now is the law of the jungle," government spokesman Mussa Ibrahim told a news conference. "We think now it is clear to everyone that what is happening in Libya has nothing to do with the protection of civilians."

Authorities said Gaddafi's youngest son, Saif Al-Arab, had been killed in the attack. Saif al-Arab is one of Gaddafi's less prominent sons, with a limited role in the Tripoli power structure.

Of course, condemnations of the attack are coming from the usual suspects, most prominent among them Hugo Chavez, star of stage and screen, and a Hollywood favorite. 

Other reports this morning say that smoke has been pouring from the Italian embassy in Tripoli, as well as other Western embassies:

A day after Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi's son was killed in a NATO airstrike that targeted the strongman's compound, reports surfaced of attacks on Western embassies in Tripoli and renewed fighting broke out across the country.

Witnesses told Reuters that smoke was rising from the Italian embassy building in the Libyan capital Sunday afternoon. The UK said it was investigating reports that its own mission in Tripoli had been destroyed, the BBC reported, and protests were said to be taking place outside the US embassy.

Oh, the president of the United States spent last night telling jokes at the White House Correspondents Dinner, a dinner that received lavish press coverage, as if it were a state occasion.  There was a time when journalists were told to report the news, not to make the news.  Ah, but times have changed.

We'll follow the Libya story to see if there are any hints of serious change.  We won't have much to say about the dinner. 

May 1, 2011     Permalink

APRIL 30,  2011

BOMBING IN LIBYA – AT 11:07 P.M. ET:  Libya has announced that a son of Muammar al-Qaddafi, and three  of Qaddafi's grandchildren, have been killed in a NATO raid.  From Fox:

NATO says it struck a government building in Tripoli but can't confirm that one of Muammar al-Qaddafi's sons was killed.

Sunday's statement comes hours after an airstrike that the Libya regime said killed Qaddafi's youngest son Seif al-Arab and three of the Libyan leader's grandchildren. Qaddafi escaped unharmed.

NATO says it struck a "command and control building in the Bab al-Azizya neighborhood" Saturday evening, insisting all its targets are military in nature and linked to Qaddafi's systematic attacks on the population.

Lt. Gen. Charles Bouchard says he is aware of unconfirmed reports that some Qaddafi family members may have been killed and he regrets "all loss of life, specially the innocent civilians being harmed as a result of the ongoing conflict."

And...

Muammar Qaddafi and his wife were in the Tripoli house of his 29-year-old son when it was hit by at least one bomb dropped from a NATO warplane, according to Libyan spokesman Moussa Ibrahim.

COMMENT:  We certainly wouldn't want to minimize this event, but I'd like to see confirmation.  Some readers may recall that, in the mid-80s, President Reagan ordered a retaliatory strike on Libya after its operatives exploded a bomb in a German cafe frequented by American soldiers.  Libya announced after the strike that a child of Qaddafi had been killed.  This latest claim seems awfully familiar.

Again, we certainly wouldn't take any joy in the inadvertent killing of family members, but we'll withhold acceptance of the story.  Is it possible that NATO has decided to target Qaddafi directly, as the only means of getting him out of power?  I'm sure this will be explored by the media in the next few days.

April 30,  2011     Permalink

AND IN THE REAL WORLD – AT 11:33 A.M. ET:   At any moment there are terror attacks being planned somewhere in the world.  One apparent plan has just been broken up in Germany, and we have to ask what may be happening, secretly, on our own soil.  From CNN:

(CNN) -- A "high-ranking" al Qaeda member in Afghanistan had planned major terror attacks in Germany with at least three recruits who were recently arrested, German authorities said Saturday.

The mastermind had been making plans as early as the beginning of last year and "recruited several dedicated personnel" who were trained along the Afghan-Pakistani border and "plotted to commit at least two attacks in Germany," said federal prosecutor Rainer Griesbaum after the three made an initial court appearance Saturday in Karlsruhe.

According to a federal court statement, the main suspect is a Moroccan national identified as 29-year-old national Abdeladim El-K., who is specifically accused of getting weapons and explosives training at an al Qaeda training camp last year. Authorities believe that the al Qaeda member ordered him in spring of 2010 to carry out a bombing in Germany.

The other suspects are 31-year-old Jamil S., who has German and Moroccan citizenship; and 19-year-old Amid C., who has German and Iranian citizenship. A court statement said the three men had been plotting an attack since December.

COMMENT:  These terror groups are looking at a weakened America, a free world without leadership, and the increasing influence of Islamists in Egypt and other countries in the Muslim world.  You don't think they're encouraged, do you?

April 30, 2011     Permalink 

OBAMAN TRENDINESS – AT 10:50 A.M. ET:  It's become clear that the soaring price of fuel is cutting seriously into the American family.  But you'd never know it by listening to some Democratic spokesmen on TV.  Problem?  What problem?  These people love to talk about "long-term" solutions.  They remind me of the kind of person who, after the attack on Pearl Harbor, wanted immediately to make plans for the UN.  After all, why bother with what's happening now?

But high prices are happening now, and can wreck the plans of a generation if they go much higher.  These prices come on top of a huge recession, which, although technically over, really isn't in many American cities and towns.

Victor Davis Hanson reminds us that the Obama energy policies are a fantasy cooked up by ideologists who seem to care little about the immediate impact of their ideas: 

Are high gas prices a good thing?

That is not as dumb a question as it sounds. Examine a few revealing past remarks from President Obama and the cabinet officials who are now in charge of the nation's energy use and oil leases on federal lands. Then decide whether the current soaring gas prices are supposed to be good or bad.

In 2008, Sen. Ken Salazar (D., Colo.) - now secretary of the interior, in charge of the leasing of federal oil lands - refused to vote for any new offshore drilling...

...From 2007 to 2008, Steven Chu, now secretary of energy, weighed in frequently on global warming and the desirable price of traditional energy. At one point Chu asserted, "Somehow we have to figure out how to boost the price of gasoline to the levels in Europe." Chu also lamented, "We have lots of fossil fuel; that's really both good and bad news. We won't run out of energy, but there's enough carbon in the ground to really cook us."

In other words, $10 a gallon for gas would be desirable, while an enormous amount of recoverable American oil, gas, coal, tar sands, and oil shale should be left untapped.

During the 2008 campaign, Obama himself had strange ideas about the prospect of expensive prices for fossil-fuel-generated energy: "Under my plan of a cap-and-trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket."...

...As for consumers' plight in paying skyrocketing gas prices, the president, now and in the past, has sounded ambivalent. He recently told a questioner, "If you're complaining about the price of gas and you're only getting eight miles a gallon, you know, you might want to think about a trade-in." Few large passenger vehicles today get only eight miles a gallon, and many squeezed Americans in recessionary times cannot so breezily think of "a trade-in."

But why weren't Americans outraged by comments like that, and the policies that followed?  It's not because they were in good shape.  They weren't.  It's because the media blitz on behalf of Barack Obama, the dream of the sixties generation, overwhelmed everything else, and continues to do so.  They used to call Reagan the "Teflon president," but Obama makes Reagan look like Mr. Vulnerability. 

So much of this administration's talk about energy sounds similar to a bull session in the faculty lounge, or what we would expect from lifelong bureaucrats and public functionaries who have never experienced long commutes or struggles in the harsher, profit-driven private workplace.

Absolutely correct.

Since reelection looms, the administration now insists that high energy prices are no longer good, but suddenly bad. And the evil oil companies are mostly to blame!

And, with the help of the press, Obama may turn that into a winning argument.

April 30, 2011      Permalink

REMEMBER LIBYA? – AT 10:20 A.M. ET:  Isn't that a country in the Mideast?  Didn't we do some shooting there recently, for a few days?  Didn't Obama say that the dictator who runs the place has to get out?  Oh yes, I remember it well.

The big shot is still in power, and Obama is out campaigning.  He certainly knows how to conduct foreign policy, doesn't he? 

(Reuters) - Libyan leader Muammar Gaddafi said on Saturday he was ready for a ceasefire and negotiations provided NATO "stop its planes," but he refused to give up power as rebels and Western powers demand.

The rebels and NATO rejected Gaddafi's offer, saying it lacked credibility. A spokesman for the insurgents said the time for compromise had passed and NATO said air strikes would go on as long as Libyan civilians were being threatened.

Weeks of Western air strikes have failed to dislodge the Libyan leader, instead imposing a stalemate on a war Gaddafi looked to have been winning, with government forces held at bay in the east and around the besieged city of Misrata while fighting for control of the western mountains.

With neither side apparently able to gain the upper hand, Gaddafi struck a more conciliatory tone in an 80-minute televised address to the nation in the early hours of Saturday.

COMMENT:  Conciliatory?  The guy is still in power.  The American president shows no interest.  NATO hasn't got the will or equipment to go long term.  He sees that Syrian leaders can fire into protest crowds and get only wrist slaps.  He can afford to be conciliatory.

The late Daniel Patrick Moynihan once wrote an essay called "Defining Deviancy Down."  In it he argued that deviant, unacceptable behavior becomes acceptable over time because people get used to it.  My fear is that Americans will get used to the erratic, strange, and ineffectual foreign policy of the Obama administration, and accept it as normal.  That is a catastrophe.

April 30,  2011     Permalink