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AUGUST 12,  2014

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 11:53 P.M. ET:

BOGEY'S "BABY" DEAD AT 89 – Lauren Bacall, one of the real movie stars of the 1940s, Hollywood's golden age, has died at 89.  Her film career was associated with Humphrey Bogart, with whom she often starred, and whom she married.  He called her "baby," thus her tag, "Bogey's baby."  It was both blessing and curse.  When Bogart died in 1957 the Bogart/Bacall mystique was shattered, and Bacall's film career faded.  She did some fine stage work, though, in the 1960s.  When we lived in Manhattan she lived in the building next to ours.  I often waited in the same Chase bank line with her, but didn't know her.  She was legendarily difficult and a die-hard liberal.  But her on-screen radiance, especially playing opposite Bogart, made her a true star.  There aren't many left. 

THE USUAL – Well, Hillary Clinton's "independence" from Barack Obama lasted about two days.  From The Politico:  "Hillary Clinton called President Barack Obama on Tuesday to 'make sure he knows that nothing she said was an attempt to attack him' when she recently discussed her views on foreign policy in an interview with The Atlantic, according to a statement from a Clinton spokesman.  The statement comes amid tension between the Clinton and Obama camps in the wake of the interview. It also comes as Obama and Clinton, his former secretary of state, are due to cross paths at a social gathering Wednesday night in Martha’s Vineyard."  In the end, Hillary's lack of character always gets her.  Of course she was attacking Obama in the Atlantic interview.  It was close to scathing.  And the heat started coming immediately from the left wing of her party, which is now alarmed that Hillary can think like an American.  We'll see if she displays any courage in the future.

INCREDIBLE – From the Daily Signal:  "More than 600 convicted criminals, including felons, were among thousands of illegal immigrants freed under the Obama administration in advance of 2013 budget cuts mandated under sequestration.  That’s according to a new report today from the inspector general for the Department of Homeland Security."  And now we're told the president might well issue executive orders providing blanket amnesty for millions of undocumented immigrants, although his legal authority to do so is sketchy.  A nation of laws or a nation of chaos?

CHILLING – From the Daily Caller:  "The Federal Aviation Administration issued a temporary flight restriction on Tuesday for an area surrounding Ferguson, Missouri, the town where a police officer fatally shot an unarmed 18-year-old black man, after a St. Louis County police helicopter was fired upon Sunday night.  The flight restriction was issued Tuesday at 1:15 p.m. local time. The reason for the notice is 'TO PROVIDE A SAFE ENVIRONMENT FOR LAW ENFORCEMENT ACTIVITIES.'  A Ferguson police officer shot Michael Brown on Saturday. The incident sparked outrage in the community as Brown was reportedly unarmed and surrendering to the officer when he was shot multiple times."  I've never heard of this done before, and it raises serious questions about the vulnerability of aircraft flying low near airports. 

August 12,  2014     Permalink

GAME ON – AT 11:41 A.M. ET:  Hillary had to know this was coming.  The left is striking back at her weekend comments criticizing the Obama foreign policy.  From The Politico: 

Hillary Clinton is giving some liberals flashbacks to 2008, and not in a good way.

Progressives are wincing over Clinton’s foreign policy comments in a blockbuster interview with The Atlantic, saying her statements are excessively hawkish and reminiscent of her past support for the war in Iraq. Some foreign policy experts, meanwhile, are criticizing her views as too simplistic; one analyst called them downright disloyal to President Barack Obama.

In the interview with prominent foreign affairs writer Jeffrey Goldberg, Clinton called Obama’s decision not to back Syrian rebels early on a “failure;” stood staunchly with Israel in its fight against Hamas; took a tough tone on Iran; and said that the West Wing’s foreign policy mantra — “Don’t do stupid stuff”— is “not an organizing principle.”

Clinton has always been more of a hawk than Obama, whom she served under as secretary of state during his first term. But for many liberals, whose enthusiasm will be important if she runs again for president in 2016, her comments simply felt like code for Bush-era interventionism.

“She basically seems to be taking positions that are very similar to the vision of America’s role in the world that [in 2008] Democrats rejected,” explained Michael Cohen, a fellow at the progressive Century Foundation. That approach, he said, was “out of touch with Democrats in 2008, and it’s out of touch now.”

Prominent liberal writer Joan Walsh wrote at Salon.com that she expects to support Clinton if she runs in 2016, but she called the interview “sobering.”

“Clinton may think she can write off the anti-interventionist left — again — and win the White House this time,” Walsh warned. “But she may find out she’s wrong this time, too.”

COMMENT:  Clinton doesn't do anything without calculation.  She may well calculate that this "anti-war" (read that "left wing") base is much smaller than a lot of people think.  However, she also knows that the stay-at-home lefties cost Hubert Humphrey the presidency in 1968 by not voting in November.  In other words, they don't have to have a candidate of their own to punish Hillary.  They showed in 1968 that they were willing to see Nixon as president as long as they could punish poor Humphrey for his support of the Vietnam War. 

August 12, 2014       Permalink

THE RACKET – AT 9:44 A.M. ET:  Eric Hoffer, the "longshoreman philosopher" of the 1950s, once remarked that all causes become businesses, and then they become rackets.   Global warming is at the racket stage.  From The Hill: 

The period of atmospheric and surface warming that began in the late 1970s ended in the mid- to late 1990s, but the climate change industry is hot. Witness a new effort by Rep. Chris Van Hollen (D-Md.) to use unsupported assertions about the hugely adverse effects of greenhouse gas emissions purportedly now looming large to justify federal auctions of "carbon" permits, with the revenue inevitably used by the political class for purposes of redistribution to favored interest groups.

Van Hollen has introduced The Healthy Climate and Family Security Act of 2014, which would impose steadily declining limits on "carbon pollution" — a classic example of the political propaganda at which the climate change industry is so practiced — by auctioning permits to the "first sellers" of oil, coal and natural gas in the U.S. market. The goal would be an 80 percent reduction in greenhouse gas (GHG) emissions below 2005 levels by 2050.

Let us begin with the central congressional "finding" (that is, bland assertion) in the Van Hollen legislation: "The warming of our planet has led to more frequent, dangerous, and expensive extreme weather events, including heat waves, storms, fires, droughts, floods, and tornadoes."

Wow. With respect to the explicit assumption about the "warming of our planet": The most recent warming period ended 15 or more years ago.

And...

The language of the Van Hollen bill goes downhill from there, particularly in terms of the "finding" of "extreme weather events" and associated effects. The past two years have set a record for the fewest tornadoes ever in a similar period, and there has been no trend in the frequency of strong (F3 to F5) tornadoes in the United States since 1950. The number of wildfires is in a long-term decline. It has been eight years since a Category 3 or higher hurricane landed on the U.S. coast; that long a period devoid of an intense hurricane landfall has not been observed since 1900. The 2013 Atlantic hurricane season was the least active in 40 years, with zero major hurricanes. There has been no trend in the frequency or intensity of tropical cyclones, and global cyclone activity and energy are near their lowest levels since reliable measurements began by satellite in the 1970s. There is no long-term trend in sea-level increases. The record of changes in the size of the Arctic ice cover is far more ambiguous than often asserted, because the satellite measurements began at the outset of the warming period from roughly the late 1970s through the mid- to late 1990s. The Palmer Drought Severity Index shows no trend since 1895.

COMMENT:  Facts are interesting, aren't they?  And yet the beat goes on.  Grants are given.  "Green" companies are founded, sometimes with federal help.  We're told the sky is falling, but it remains firmly in place.

And this, at least in my region, is one of the coolest summers on recent record.

Al Gore is becoming increasingly inconvenient.  But Obama will regulate away during his last two years in office, damaging our economy on behalf of a set of wobbly theories that wobble more and more every day.

August 12, 2014       Permalink

THE TRUTH COMES OUT – AT 9:21 A.M. ET:  During the active phase of the Israel/Hamas battle, many observers believed we were getting only part of the story out of Gaza – war from the Hamas point of view.   Commentators asked why we never saw any Hamas fighters, why we never saw rocket launchers, why we only saw casualties who were young or female?

The answers are starting to come out, and they usually fall within the category of intimidation.  From The Times of Israel:   

An umbrella group representing foreign journalists working in Israel and the Palestinian Authority strongly condemned Hamas Monday for what it said were attempts to intimidate them and interfere with their coverage of the fighting in Gaza.

In a sharply worded reproach of Gaza’s de facto rulers that was posted on its website, the Foreign Press Association denounced Hamas’s attempts to control foreign press coverage and efforts to discriminate against those who don’t comply with its demands.

“The FPA protests in the strongest terms the blatant, incessant, forceful and unorthodox methods employed by the Hamas authorities and their representatives against visiting international journalists in Gaza over the past month,” the statement said. “The international media are not advocacy organizations and cannot be prevented from reporting by means of threats or pressure, thereby denying their readers and viewers an objective picture from the ground.”

As well as targeting journalists in Gaza, the press organization said it was aware that Hamas has also been taking steps to vet those media personnel it doesn’t approve of and to prevent them from reporting in Gaza.

“Such a procedure is vehemently opposed by the FPA,” the statement said.

The FPA asserted that “in several cases, foreign reporters working in Gaza have been harassed, threatened or questioned over stories or information they have reported through their news media or by means of social media.”

A numbers of reporters working in Gaza reported on Hamas’s use of civilian infrastructure for military means, but said they were only able to do so once out of the Strip, for fear of Hamas reprisals.

A report by India-based NDTV last week on Hamas assembling and firing a rocket next to a hotel used by journalists was filed hours after the reporter left Gaza, because “Hamas has not taken very kindly to any reporting of its rockets being fired,” he wrote.

COMMENT:  I saw some pretty bad stuff on our TV, but I understand foreign reports from Gaza were far worse, far more anti-Israel.  Some of that was the bias of the European press, but some was caused by the inability of the media to get past Hamas. 

Now we know at least some of the truth.  I believe it's incumbent on news organizations, whenever it's possible, and taking into account the safety of reporters, to level with readers and viewers about the difficulty journalists might have in an area.  That has not been done to any acceptable degree. 

August 12, 2014       Permalink

WELCOME TO THE RECOVERY – AT 9:04 A.M. ET:  American workers have been hit hard.  From Breitbart: 

U.S. jobs pay an average 23% less today than they did before the 2008 recession, according to a new report released on Monday by the United States Conference of Mayors.

In total, the report found $93 billion in lost wages.

Jobs lost during the recession paid an average $61,637. As of 2014, jobs in the same sectors paid an average of $47,171 annually.

"Under a similar analysis conducted by the Conference of Mayors during the 2001-2002 recession, the wage gap was only 12% compared to the current 23%--meaning the wage gap has nearly doubled from one recession to the next," stated the Conference of Mayors in a statement.

The report also found that 73% of metro area households earn salaries of less than $35,000 a year.
President Barack Obama, who is on a two-week vacation at Martha's Vineyard, has yet to comment on the dour economic findings.

COMMENT:  This is awful.  It can't be attributed entirely to Obama, but his backward economic policies haven't helped, and his aversion to free enterprise and its potential has certainly not helped.

One serious economic bump and we'll be back in recession.  As it is, Americans are getting used to an economic status lower than they had before.  That is the saddest part.

August 12,  2014    Permalink

AUGUST 11,  2014

SHORT TAKES ON THE DRIFTING WRECKAGE – AT 8:32 P.M. ET: 

ROBIN WILLIAMS AN APPARENT SUICIDE – From The New York Times:  "The actor Robin Williams died on Monday morning, his publicist, Mara Buxbaum, said in a statement.  Mr. Williams, 63, had been battling severe depression recently, the statement said.  Mr. Williams was found unconscious at his home in Tiburon, Calif., around noon on Monday, the Marin County Sheriff’s Office said in a statement. His death appeared to be a suicide due to asphyxia, the statement said."  As I learned while working at The Tonight Show, comedians aren't, as human beings, very funny.  They're often very serious and very sad, and often angry.  Comedy is classically defined as tragedy plus time.  Today we saw the tragedy. 

WE COULD USE THIS ON OUR SOUTHERN BORDER – From the Jerusalem Post:  "A system designed to detect infiltration tunnels proved successful in laboratory tests for the first time ever and is now being tested in the field, a senior Israel Defense Forces (IDF) officer said Monday.  If the field test proves successful, the system can be deployed around the Gaza Strip within approximately one year, the officer added."  We could use a system like this on our Southern border.  There have already been tunnels discovered.  I hope the Obamans don't turn it down on the grounds that it would offend the sensibilities of infiltrators.

CANDIDATE VS. PRESIDENT – This quote, from Barack Obama in 2008, is making the internet rounds:  "You have to understand that if you seek that office, then you have to be prepared to give your life to it. Essentially, the bargain that I think every president strikes with the American people is, ‘you give me this office, then in turn my fears, doubts, insecurities, foibles, need for sleep, family life, vacations, leisure, is gone. I am giving myself to you.’"  Yeah, what a gift we got.  As this is being written, Mr. Sacrifice is once again on Martha's Vineyard. 

HILLARY VS. THE CHIEF – From The Weekly Standard:  "White House deputy national security adviser Ben Rhodes publicly responded to criticism from Hillary Clinton of Barack Obama's foreign policy back in June, just as Hillary's book tour was starting up. 'On the broad thrust of our foreign policy, she was fully on board,' Rhodes tells Politico.  It's worth remembering Rhodes's comments now that Hillary Clinton's recent interview has been published where she seems to be bashing elements of Obama's foreign policy."  This is becoming a really big story, with much ink expended on speculation as to why Hillary is making this move now, separating herself from a foreign policy she was ordered to carry out.  We'll have much more on the juicy split as it develops.  I love it.

August 11,  2014     Permalink

CALL THE MOVING VANS – AT 10:18 A.M. ET:  USA TODAY has run a fascinating piece, with an accompanying map/chart, about the most, and least, conservative cities in America.  You might want to save this: 

Mesa is the most conservative big city in the country, according to research examining municipal politics nationwide.

And, little surprise, San Francisco is the most liberal.

The paper, "Representation in Municipal Government," analyzed public policy in cities across the country in search of trends in local ideology.

Chris Tausanovitch and Christopher Warshaw, political science professors at UCLA and MIT, respectively, authored the study. In researching the paper, the pair examined the average policy preferences of residents in the 51 U.S. cities with populations exceeding 250,000. They then compared them to the policies of those cities to see if political leanings were reflected in tax burdens and other city operations.

"The policies enacted by cities across a range of policy areas correspond with the liberal-conservative positions of their citizens on national policy issues," the professors wrote.

Most right leaning: Mesa, Oklahoma City, Virginia Beach

Only 11 cities were found to be conservative-leaning, two were neutral, and the rest were liberal. Mesa, a Phoenix-area suburb with a population of about 468,000, easily grabbed the top spot for most conservative city in the country. Oklahoma City and Virginia Beach, Va., followed as the next most right-leaning.

San Francisco held the distinction as the nation's most liberal city, followed by Washington, D.C., Seattle, and Oakland.

Two other Arizona cities, Phoenix and Tucson were on the list. While both showed up as liberal leaning, Phoenix was barely left of center and Tucson was several spots further left.

The study also took into account outside variables such as term limits and the mayorship, but found that those institutions did little to sway the majority public opinion in local settings. "These results demonstrate a robust role for citizen policy preferences in determining municipal policy outcomes," the study said.

COMMENT:  I've contacted my favorite mover in case I have to get out fast.  Always have your bags packed.

August 11,  2014     Permalink

HILLARY STILL STRONG? – AT 9:31 A.M. ET:  Her book rollout was a disaster.  Gossip about her vast speaking fees didn't help.  Talk about her health did further damage.  Slippage in some polls added to the mess.  And rumors that Barack Obama was making moves to support Elizabeth Warren suggested that Hillary was not at all the sure thing that had been advertised.

And yet, as Jay Cost of The Weekly Standard observes, she's still there, still the one to beat.  And, I suspect, many of the more mature members of the Democratic Party, who have not joined the commune on the far left, are starting to realize that Hillary, with all her faults, is still the grown-up in the room:

The rollout of Hillary Clinton’s new memoirs, Hard Choices, was not a resounding success for the former secretary of state. She stuck her foot in her mouth regarding her family’s vast fortune. She had trouble answering questions about her evolution on gay marriage. Critics, on the whole, found the book tired and shopworn.

Yet her poll numbers remain surprisingly solid. Surveys conducted by Quinnipiac University, Fox News, and Rasmussen Reports—all taken since the book’s release—show her with comfortable leads nationally over Rand Paul, Chris Christie, and Jeb Bush. A mid-July CNN poll shows her with generally strong favorable ratings, although not as positive as they were when she wrapped up her tenure at State. Even so, respondents said they thought her to be a “strong and decisive leader” who “generally agrees” with them on the issues, can “manage the government effectively,” and “cares about people” like them.

What lessons are there to draw from these numbers? The first, and probably most obvious, is the disconnect between the political class and the greater public. Clinton’s book rollout was a disaster among politicos and cable news obsessives, but people who do not dedicate inordinate time to politics and policy hardly seemed to notice. While this might be disappointing for conservatives, who would like to see Clinton’s numbers brought back to Earth, it is nevertheless a good reminder that what matters in the Beltway does not necessarily play in Peoria.

COMMENT:  Clinton's foreign-policy comments yesterday, drawing some distance between herself and Obama, were excellent, a true statement of what foreign policy should be.  If she continues on this course, running center-left, rather than bowing to the crazies, she might just pull out the 2016 election...if she can win the nomination.  I think she can.  I'm not sure she has any real competition.  Elizabeth Warren, the darling of the left, may not actually run.  She may be reluctant to take on "the first woman..."  If she runs and gets the nomination, and then loses the election, she knows she will be held responsible for denying a woman the presidency. 

Warren is also a poor campaigner.  She was elected from Massachusetts, please remember.   In most elections getting elected as a Democrat in Massachusetts is about as easy as a corpse remaining dead. 

Also, while it's true that Hillary might have to fight the increasingly powerful left in her party's establishment, it's also true that two of the greatest presidential elections in our lifetime – 1960 and 1980 – were won by candidates who had to fight the party establishment for their nomination.  Both Jack Kennedy and Ronald Reagan went on to November victories.

The Dems are getting interesting.  But our side is a lot more interesting.

August 11, 2014       Permalink

WISCONSIN WARNING – AT 9:07 A.M. ET:  No governor has done more for his state in recent years than Scott Walker, the governor of Wisconsin.  He saved Wisconsin from the financial fate being experienced by his distraught neighbor to the south, Illinois. 

He also led a battle to tame the public-service unions.  In retaliation, they led a campaign to recall him.  He won his recall election by a greater margin than he'd achieved in his gubernatorial election. 

But now, running for re-election, Walker is in a tight race, and may be defeated.  It would be an enormous loss for Wisconsin and the country, and proof, once again, that no good deed goes unpunished.  From TIME:

There are few Republicans who Democrats hate more than Scott Walker. Two years ago, Democratic groups spent $20 million trying to recall the Wisconsin governor, unsuccessfully. He has since raised a staggering $19 million and seems untouchable. So how is Walker is in the race of his life against Democrat Mary Burke?

After winning a close election in 2011, Walker drew the ire of unions and Democratic groups after he passed Act 10, which took collective bargaining away from government workers. His 2012 recall made him the champion of fiscal conservatives and free market right wingers. So much so that a year ago, when Walker made a trip to Iowa, he ignited a storm of 2016 presidential speculation. For awhile, Walker looked poised to sail through reelection and on to bigger and brighter things.

Then federal prosecutors announced in June that Walker, his chief of staff and others around him participated in a “criminal scheme” to illegally coordinate with outside groups during his campaign and recall. That case fizzled and a special prosecutor announced that Walker was not the target of an investigation and that there was not yet sufficient evidence to charge anyone with a crime. Walker dodged a bullet, but it was only the beginning of what has become a tough summer for him.

Walker’s approval rating has slid down below 50%, and his disapproval rating has crawled up to 48%. His stated second term agenda has underwhelmed pundits, who accused him of coasting. And Wisconsin’s job situation, while improved, is still struggling. Walker’s job creation record hasn’t lived up to his hype and his new created Economic Development Corporation has been mired with problems. Enter Mary Burke. “She’s running a very disciplined campaign essentially saying: I’m not Scott Walker,” says Mordecai Lee, a University of Wisconsin Milwaukee political science professor. “She has really positioned herself as a no name moderate Democrat—fiscally conserve but socially liberal.”

COMMENT:  Essentially, Burke is running as a nothing, and has kept her distance from Barack Obama.

Look, when you actually do anything, you make enemies.  Walker has a host of them, especially those who want a chunk of the public treasury.  His defeat would send the worst possible message to governors trying to prevent their states from going under. 

We root for Scott, and my hunch is that he'll pull it out.

August 11, 2014       Permalink

IT'S ABOUT TIME – AT 8:46 A.M. ET:  The Kurds are a pro-American people who are theoretically part of Iraq, but essentially live independently.  Despite their loyalty to America, we have treated them badly, often taking them for granted.  Maybe that's about to change, although I wouldn't trust the long-term plans of this administration.  From WaPo: 

The United States is sending weapons to Kurdish forces in Iraq who have begun to roll back gains made by Sunni militants, a senior U.S. official confirmed to Fox News.

Long, long overdue.

A senior State Department official told The Associated Press that the Kurds are "getting arms from various sources. They are being rearmed."

Providing weapons to Kurdish forces is a reversal of U.S. policy, which previously had only allowed for selling arms directly to the Iraqi government. In recent days, the U.S. military has been helping facilitate weapons deliveries from the Iraqis to the Kurds, providing logistical assistance and transportation to the north.

Sources say the weapons from the U.S. will not be provided directly from the Pentagon. Officials wouldn't say which agency is spearheading the effort, though the CIA historically has done similar arming operations.

State Department spokeswoman Marie Harf noted that the administration previously mentioned the new arms deliveries, which she suggested are being made to contend with the "heavy weaponry" obtained by Islamic militants.

"The Kurds need additional arms and we're providing those," she said in a statement.

The move to directly aid the Kurds underscores the level of U.S. concern about the Islamic State militants' gains in the north, and reflects the persistent administration view that the Iraqis must take the necessary steps to solve their own security problems.

COMMENT:  The Kurds will fight.  And events in Syria have shown that when the Islamic nuts are confronted by a well-disciplined group of troops, they run into trouble. 

But I hope it's not too late.  So much of Iraq has been overrun by ISIS.  The Iraqi government is in turmoil, and nominal allies of the United States are being turned into refugees, not fighters.  Also, no one knows when Obama will pull the plug on aid.  The only long haul he's ever hauled is his own career.

August 11,  2014     Permalink