I have a new piece up at Hudson New York today, "Is The Free Press Failing Us?"  For those interested, it's here.

TUESDAY,  JULY 7,  2009

EUROPEAN HEALTH, AND LACK OF IT - AT 8:53 P.M. ET:  Reader Carol Darien alerts us to a well-reported AP piece on European health care.  It's decidely a mixed picture, and, if you're at the wrong end of the mix, consequences can be grim:

The concept has been enshrined in Europe for generations. Health systems are built so inclusive that even illegal immigrants are entitled to free treatment beyond just emergency care. Europeans have some of the world's best hospitals and have made great strides in fighting problems like obesity and heart disease.

But the system is far from perfect.

In Britain, France, Switzerland and elsewhere, public health systems have become political punching bags for opposition parties, costs have skyrocketed and in some cases, patients have needlessly suffered and died...

...Critics fear Obama's reforms will lead to more government control over health care and cite problems faced by European health systems as examples of what not to do.

And...

Many European health officials applaud Obama's attempt to provide health care to millions more Americans, but they also advise him to proceed with caution.

"What we can be proud of in Europe is the ground rules, that everyone has the right to health care," said Jose Martin-Moreno, a health expert at the University of Valencia in Spain. "But the implementation has been difficult and one size does not fit all."

Private health care is also available in Europe, creating in some instances a two-tier system that critics say defeats the egalitarian impulse on which national systems were built.

COMMENT:  In other words, we'd better proceed from facts, not from slogans or generalities.  We are talking about the sanctity of human life, a concept that some on the left treat rather cavalierly.  We are also talking about profound moral issues.  How much care do we give the dying?  The child with life-shortening defects?  The great scientist as opposed to the factory worker who may be competing for an available organ?

So far, our "debate" has been superficial and off-handed.  We can do better.

July 7, 2009   Permalink

AND NOW THE MOSCOW CRUNCH - AT 7:52 P.M. ET:  Reality has begun to interfere with President Obama's mission to Moscow, which will undoubtedly be described as the greatest diplomatic success since Neville Chamberlain flew back from Munich.  The Russians have little patience for sentiment.  From AP:

MOSCOW -- Russia's foreign minister warned Tuesday that the U.S. would jeopardize progress toward a new treaty with Russia on nuclear arms cuts if it decides to create a global missile defense system.

Sergey Lavrov spoke a day after the Russian and U.S. presidents reached a preliminary agreement setting targets for further reductions of the world's largest offensive nuclear arsenals.

Lavrov's message was that Russia will not agree to the cuts - which both countries say they want to codify in a treaty before the existing START I agreement expires in December - if the U.S. fails to assuage Moscow's concerns over missile defense plans.

COMMENT:  Talk about a bottom line.  This has been the Russian line for years.  President Bush wouldn't buckle under.  Will The One?  As he faces falling poll numbers at home, will President Obama yield to his leftist temptation and try to make the Massachusetts and California congressional delegations happy?  Or will he pursue the national interest of the United States?

It is crunch time, in many ways, for this administration.  Just wait for autumn.

July 7, 2009   Permalink

IRAN STILL BOILING - AT 4:29 P.M. ET:  Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi alerts us to another superb column by Michael Ledeen, who gets it right on Iran.  Note this quote:

Meanwhile, the American Government was sending conflicting signals to Tehran. On the one hand, it seems that Obama will be going to the upcoming G8 conference with a request that there be no new sanctions on Iran. This comes at a time when the Europeans, for the first time, seem inclined to get at least a little bit tougher on the mullahs, and it effectively demolishes the myth that this administration intends to do anything to support the Iranian people in their life and death struggle for freedom (perhaps this should not surprise us; after all, Obama’s 4th of July message did not contain the word “freedom,” but it did talk a lot about his own legislative proposals). At the same time, Vice President Joe Biden three times said the United States would do nothing to prevent an Israeli attack against Iranian nuclear targets.

So apparently we’re prepared to let the Israelis do our dirty work. A real standup sort of policy.

COMMENT:  The president's poll numbers are dropping - see our posts below at 10:15 a.m. and 3:10 p.m.  The Obama foreign policy is being scrutinized more and more, if only by bloggers and the few journalists trying to work around the mainstream media.  The honeymoon is fading.

July 7, 2009   Permalink 

YOU WILL NOT BELIEVE - AT 4:13 P.M. ET:  This is the actual text of a bulletin just moved by CNN, under the heading, BREAKING NEWS:

At memorial service in L.A., Michael Jackson's daughter Paris says he was "the best father you could ever imagine."

We used to interrupt programs for Pearl Harbor, Dallas in 1963, stuff like that. 

July 7, 2009   Permalink

MORE BAD POLLING NEWS FOR OBAMA - AT 3:10 P.M. ET:  From The Politico:

A new Quinnipiac poll shows President Obama’s approval rating has dropped 13 points over the last two months in Ohio, a key battleground state with plenty of critical Congressional contests in 2010.

Obama now only holds a 49 percent approval rating, with 44 percent of voters disapproving. It’s his lowest approval rating in any Quinnipiac statewide poll taken since Obama’s inauguration. In May, Obama held a 62 percent approval rating in the Buckeye state.

Meanwhile, a 48 percent plurality of Ohio voters disapprove of the way Obama is handling the economy, with 46 percent approving. Two-thirds of Ohio voters are dissatisfied with the way things are going in the state.

COMMENT:  If this trend continues, 2010 could be a free-for-all.  And Obama's legislative program could be blocked...by moderate Democrats trying to prove how moderate they are.

July 7, 2009   Permalink

EXCESS - AT 2:57 P.M. ET:  I was just monitoring the TV networks.  Every major network, and all the cable news systems, are carrying the Michael Jackson memorial service live.  Sinatra never got this treatment.  Nor did Johnny Carson.  Both men were vastly more important, and had an impact on the culture over many more years.  And I recall how the networks would routinely reject President Bush's requests for air time when he addressed the nation.

Say nothing bad about the dead.  I'm sure Jackson was an exciting entertainer.  But the excess here is vulgar, a sad reflection on the values of many Americans. 

On the stage at the Staples Center is Michael Jackson, in a golden casket.  It would have been far nobler to have a simple coffin, with the money saved devoted to a favorite charity.

I flipped channels just as Al Sharpton was speaking.  What precisely does he have to do with Michael Jackson? 

We buried Ed McMahon, decent guy, Marine pilot; we buried Farrah Fawcett, once one of the most famous women in the world, whose struggle with cancer was an inspiration; we will bury Karl Malden, one of our finest actors.  No live coverage for any of them.

July 7, 2009   Permalink

BULLETIN:  RASMUSSEN POLL - OBAMA AT LOWEST POINT - AT 10:15 A.M. ET:  We always caution that polls are snapshots in time, but Scott Rasmussen has been tracking a steady decline for Barack Obama.  Today he reports:

The Rasmussen Reports daily Presidential Tracking Poll for Tuesday shows that 33% of the nation's voters now Strongly Approve of the way that Barack Obama is performing his role as President. Thirty-six percent (36%) Strongly Disapprove giving Obama a Presidential Approval Index rating of –3. Those figures reflect the highest level of strong disapproval measured to date and the lowest level recorded for the overall Approval Index.

Overall approval reported by Rasmussen today stands at 52% approving, 47% not. 

Again, caution.  We'll be following this.  If Obama starts to hover around 50%, that is trouble.  His approval right after inauguration, in the Rasmussen poll, was 65%. 

Presidents normally decline in popularity as the honeymoon ends.  The extent of that decline is the thing to watch.

July 7, 2009   Permalink

INTRIGUING - AT 9:41 A.M. ET:  There's been substantial buzz about Joe Biden's implied "green light" for Israel to launch an attack on Iran's nuclear facilities.  Of course, he didn't put it that directly in a TV interview over the weekend.  He simply said that we could not prevent another country from doing what it felt it had to do in its own defense.  But the message got through.

Now President Obama is hotly denying that we gave any such green light.  Or is he?  His statement, made in Moscow and reported by the Jerusalem Post, actually adds to the intrigue:

US President Barack Obama on Tuesday strongly denied that the United States had given Israel an approval to strike Iran's nuclear facilities.

Asked by CNN whether Washington had given Israel a green light for such an attack, Obama answered: "Absolutely not."

But there was a caveat.  Consider:

In the interview, which was broadcast from Russia, where Obama is on an official visit, he added: "We can't dictate to other countries what their security interests are.

"What is also true is, it is the policy of the United States to try to resolve the issue of Iran's nuclear capabilities," Obama said.

COMMENT:   Ah.  No green light, but we can't dictate to other countries "what their security interests are."  And it's our policy to "try" to to resolve the Iranian nuclear issue.

Actually, Obama said pretty much what Biden said. 

Of course, we'll never admit to giving a green light, but I do detect a splash of green amidst the yellow.

July 7, 2009   Permalink

TRIAL BALLOON - SHOOT IT DOWN - AT 8:41 A.M. ET:  The economic masterminds in Washington apparently have the itch to spend again.  There are various home remedies for this - taking the checkbook away from the offender, locking teenagers in rooms, cutting up the department-store cards - but a stronger defense is needed on the national level.  Stop them before they spend again:

July 7 (Bloomberg) -- The U.S. should consider drafting a second stimulus package focusing on infrastructure projects because the $787 billion approved in February was “a bit too small,” said Laura Tyson, an adviser to President Barack Obama.

The current plan “will have a positive effect, but the real economy is a sicker patient,” Tyson said in a speech in Singapore today. The package will have a more pronounced impact in the third and fourth quarters, she added, stressing that she was speaking for herself and not the administration.

COMMENT:  I'm not an economist and give no economic prescriptions, but we do know that the American people, as shown in one survey after another, are becoming deeply apprehensive over the level of spending and debt generated by Washington.  That apprehension easily translates into fear and lack of confidence.  It does not translate into hiring new employees or buying new items. 

We hope this economic decline doesn't get worse, but it might.  If it does, Mr. Obama will dream of a return to his first six months in office.

July 7, 2009   Permalink  

QUOTE OF THE DAY - AT 8:16 A.M. ET:  From Stanley Fish of The New York Times, who has earned my grudging respect for his regular refusal to go along with the party line.  He discusses Sarah Palin's resignation, and gives us a refreshing point of view:

She dated the beginning of her trials and tribulations from the moment in August, 2008, when “political operatives descended on Alaska digging for dirt.” She complained that “millions of dollars go down the drain in this new political environment.” She signaled repeatedly her weariness with the “superficial political blood–sport” politics has become. She returned to her own sport, basketball, to explain that because she had become a distraction she was going to do what a good point guard always does, pass the ball to someone (her lieutenant governor) in a better position to make the shot. And in the end she earned the declaration that “I have given my reasons plainly and candidly.”

But the pundits didn’t want to hear them or, rather, they were committed to believing that the real reasons lay elsewhere, and were strategic. They couldn’t fathom the possibility that she was just giving voice to her feelings. It must, they assumed, be a calculation, and having decided that, they happily went on to describe how bad a calculation it was.

COMMENT:  Good for Stanley Fish.  He proposes the possibility that Sarah's resignation was heartfelt.  He may be right or wrong on this, but at least he's willing, unlike many other "journalists," to give the governor a chance.  I hope he watches his back at The New York Times.

July 7, 2009   Permalink

McNAMARA - AT 7:49 A.M. ET:  On the day that I received my graduate degree from Columbia University, Robert McNamara, then secretary of defense for John F. Kennedy, was receiving an honorary doctorate.  It was entirely routine in those days for elite universities to honor men associated with national defense.  Most of the people in our universities actually believed in it.  That is not necessarily the case today, although, in fairness, we should point out that Princeton recently had Gen. David Petraeus, who holds a Ph.D. from that university, as a graduation speaker. 

McNamara's death, announced yesterday, has prompted the most detailed and passionate obits of any secretary of defense in memory.  That is due, obviously, to the fact that he's seen, rightly or wrongly, as the prime architect of the Vietnam War.  His death gives the journalistic and academic left a chance to remind us of its glory days opposing that war.  Of course, this crowd will never remind us that, once the North Vietnamese seized South Vietnam, and imposed a total, brutal dictatorship, the so-called "anti-war" movement showed not the slightest interest at all.  Enough lies have been told about Vietnam to keep us for a century.

I never cared for McNamara, who rarely seemed to get the main point of anything.  He was one of those men who intellectualized all subjects to death.  He was the perfect example to illustrate a famous story told about Lyndon B. Johnson.  After attending his first Cabinet meeting as Jack Kennedy's vice president, Johnson rushed to Capitol Hill to consult with his old mentor, Speaker of the House Sam Rayburn.  Johnson told Rayburn of his wonder at the assemblage of men he'd just left - from Harvard, Yale, MIT, with all kinds of degrees.  Rayburn thought about it for a moment, then replied soberly, and the exact words differ depending on who's telling it, "Lyndon, I'd feel a lot better if one of them had run for sheriff."

Those were days when it was thought by some that every problem had an intellectual solution, that running for sheriff was for the lesser classes, that practical experience was a way out for those with average college board scores.  If you're getting the sense that you're seeing a sequel today, you're right.  The Obama administration has much the same character:  We are omnipotent because we are smart, because we know how to reason, because we speak well.

For two somewhat rough, but, I think, accurate assessments of McNamara, check Bret Stephens in the Wall Street Journal here, and Jonathan Tobin at Contentions here.

July 7, 2009   Permalink

MONDAY,  JULY 6,  2009

TO YOUR GOVERNMENT-DETERMINED MINIMAL HEALTH - AT 8:05 P.M. ET:  It may be symbolic, but the president is in Moscow just as his legions in Congress are trying to introduce a brand of socialism to the American health-care system.  Ah, maybe Barack and Michelle can visit some of those healthy Muscovites, and ask how they like government control of their livers.  Or, maybe Mr. Obama can fly on to Britain and symbolically put his name on a waiting list for an operation.  Should be available a bit before the end of his term.  Or, even more tingling to the legs of the left wing of his party, he can jet into Cuba and see the marvels of free medical care.  Just don't ask about any other freedoms.  This new administration "understands" other cultures.

What chills us is that we're having a debate without information.  What precisely is the problem in our health-care system?  Does it need an overhaul?  Or patches?  Why should the government be involved?  If saving money is the goal, when has the government ever saved any health-care dollars?  And perhaps most important, does independent research, including good journalism, support the claims made by the administration or its critics?

The press has been next to shameful.  There is little depth to the reporting on health care.  There are anecdotes and claims, but the kind of three-column story that would set the record straight is lacking.  Even the cable news operations, which have plenty of time, have only dealt with the facts of health care superficially.

Also lacking is plain common sense, a phrase that often panics the educated elite, who believe that all knowledge is contained in their sheepskins.  (Truth in packaging:  I actually qualify as part of that club, but I refuse to apply for a membership card.)  Often, especially when something as personal as health care is concerned, simple observation can tell us a great deal.

Example:  I recall, many years ago, that there were campaigns to get operations for children whose families couldn't afford the care.  The press loved them, often sponsored them.  "Get Johnny cured!"  "A new life for Annie!"  In a grim way, we were fascinated by these campaigns.  Write a check, save a kid.

But I haven't seen a campaign like that in decades.  Why? What does that tell us about our system?  And when is the last time you saw a story of anyone being denied medical care because he or she couldn't pay a bill?  I don't remember the last time.

What do these observations say about American health care?  The fact is, there are many programs available for people who can't pay medical bills.  Hospitals, often by law, are set up to handle cases where payment is in doubt.  It's far from a perfect system, and improvement is indicated.  But people do get care.  We do not see bodies in the streets.  Question:  Shouldn't we improve on this system rather than overhaul the entire medical delivery mechanism?  And is government the proper party to do this?  If there's a leak in one pipe in your home, you don't normally rip out all the plumbing.  You patch the broken pipe.

Some years ago I attended a seminar run by Public Broadcasting System (PBS) in New York.  They were thinking of putting on a medical information program.  The purpose was to encourage members of minority groups to seek medical care, which was amply available to them.  The dirty little secret of the health care system is that many people who don't receive care don't get it because they don't want it - either because they don't want to spend the money and think they can beat the odds, or because their culture doesn't put much emphasis on things like preventive care. 

And there's another point that requires mention:  Sometimes the tragedies that some commentators attribute to a defective medical system have nothing to do with medicine at all.  A few years ago I was commenting to a writer friend of mine, who lives in another part of the country, how few members of my high school class were deceased.  It was about five percent.  My friend replied that in his class, which was even younger, the number was closer to 35%.  I asked him what possibly could cause that disparity.  He answered, "You have to realize where we live.  It's guns, cars, and alcohol."  Lifestyle plays a role, sometimes a dramatic role. 

We need more facts, better reporting, more details, before we overhaul a medical system that, for most Americans, delivers quality service.  Here is where the press can excel.  It hasn't excelled.  But you can be sure that, if you tune in tonight, you'll get five more stories on the death of Michael Jackson.

July 6, 2009   Permalink       

REQUIRED LEGAL WARNING - AT 5:14 P.M. ET:  Urgent Agenda advisers are urged to read the stories coming out of Moscow with two eyes, and a third if you are so blessed.  The New York Times breathlessly reports:

MOSCOW — The United States and Russia, seeking to move forward on one of the most significant arms control treaties since the end of the cold war, announced Monday that they had reached a preliminary agreement on cutting each country’s stockpiles of strategic nuclear weapons by as much as one-third.

COMMENT:  The key words are "preliminary agreement."  The piece of paper has no details, does not even provide for verification, and is essentially just an expression of intent.  "Yes, Alphonse, I will marry you."  The marriage may or may not take place.

This agreement is not a treaty, is not yet ready for ratification, and may never be.  It's eyewash.  Follow the story closely and watch the details.  Watch what we're willing to give up to get the thing in final shape.  That will be the payoff.

July 6, 2009   Permalink 

CALIFORNIA, HERE I COME...WELL, NOT NOW - AT 8:41 A.M. ET:  The California mess - it's our largest state, after all, with a population similar in size to Canada's - is going to be felt around the country.  Kevin Hassett, at Bloomberg, believes it may kill off Obamanomics itself:

July 6 (Bloomberg) -- Last week, we discovered that the state of California will gladly pay you Tuesday for a hamburger today.

With California mired in a budget crisis, largely the result of a political impasse that makes spending cuts and tax increases impossible, Controller John Chiang said the state planned to issue $3.3 billion in IOU’s in July alone. Instead of cash, those who do business with California will get slips of paper.

The California morass has Democrats in Washington trembling. The reason is simple. If Obama’s health-care plan passes, then we may well end up paying for it with federal slips of paper worth less than California’s. Obama has bet everything on passing health care this year. The publicity surrounding the California debt fiasco almost assures his resounding defeat.

COMMENT:  I don't think most Americans, and maybe even most journalists, recognize how deep the economic decline has been.  California's troubles have been chronicled.  Other states are also in serious trouble, and so are large cities.  Unemployment continues to rise.  We're assured by the usual suspects that it isn't rising as fast as before, and so we should smile a bit.  That's like saying the Titanic isn't sinking as fast as it was sinking an hour ago. 

There is a new load of foreclosures coming.  And this time they're coming in the prime real-estate market.  And other countries are showing reluctance to back our debt.  We'll get through the summer doldrums, but it will be an exciting fall.

July 6, 2009   Permalink

SARAH - THE ANALYSIS - AT 8:28 A.M. ET:  Moderate conservative Ross  Douthat, in The New York Times, argues that Sarah Palin's troubles began when she accepted the vice presidential nomination on the Republican ticket last year.  Douthat is right.  It was after Sarah's acceptance that the wild-eyed attacks on her began.

And Douthat makes another point, echoing something from our own Angel's Corner over the weekend - that the assault on Palin was, at least in large part, cultural:

Palin’s popularity has as much to do with class as it does with ideology. In this sense, she really is the perfect foil for Barack Obama. Our president represents the meritocratic ideal — that anyone, from any background, can grow up to attend Columbia and Harvard Law School and become a great American success story. But Sarah Palin represents the democratic ideal — that anyone can grow up to be a great success story without graduating from Columbia and Harvard.

But, while conceding correctly that Palin has made serious mistakes, Douthat notes that the attacks on her have been stunning, overwhelming, and vicious:

All of this had something to do with ordinary partisan politics. But it had everything to do with Palin’s gender and her social class.

Sarah Palin is beloved by millions because her rise suggested, however temporarily, that the old American aphorism about how anyone can grow up to be president might actually be true.

But her unhappy sojourn on the national stage has had a different moral: Don’t even think about it.

COMMENT:  Douthat's op-ed colleagues - Gail Collins and Maureen Dowd - have been among the most despicable in their attacks on Sarah Palin.  Douthat is new to The Times, and his comments took some spine to write.  Good for him.

July 6, 2009   Permalink

MIDEAST MACHINATIONS - AT 7:48 A.M. ET:  The news out of the Mideast becomes more and more intriguing.  In the last few days Vice President Joe Biden has said that the U.S. could not prevent Israel, a sovereign nation, from doing what it needs to do to defend against a nuclear weapons-developing Iran.  At the same time, the Times of London reported that Saudi Arabia had agreed to let Israeli jets overfly Saudi territory on a run into Iran.  That second report has been officially denied, but of course it has to be.

Now we learn that military plans in Israel are underway, and the target is pretty obvious.  The Jerusalem Post reports:

On the day that US Vice President Joe Biden seemed to give Israel a green light for military action to eliminate Iran's nuclear threat, The Jerusalem Post learned that the IAF plans to participate in aerial exercises in the US and Europe in the coming months with the aim of training its pilots for long-range flights.

And...

IAF (Israel Air Force) planes will take part this year in a joint aerial exercise with a NATO-member state that cannot be identified.

In addition, later this month, the air force will send F-16C fighter jets to participate in the Red Flag exercise at the Nellis Air Force Base in Nevada. At the same time, several of the IAF's C-130 Hercules transport aircraft will participate in the Rodeo 2009 competition at the McChord Air Force Base in Washington state.

Defense officials said the overseas exercises would be used to drill long-range maneuvers. Last summer, more than 100 IAF jets flew over Greece in what was viewed as a test-run for a potential strike on Iranian nuclear facilities.

Hmm.  We shouldn't jump to conclusions, of course.  It could be that the U.S., working with Israel, is simply sending a tougher message to Tehran, but will back down later.  On the other hand, maybe Israel has made plain that it will act without American approval if it feels it must neutralize the Iranian nuclear program.

Stay tuned.  This is getting very interesting.  And remember that the missile shield the U.S. wants to place in Eastern Europe, and which already has Polish and Czech approval, is directed at Iran.  As we noted in our story below, Obama is in Moscow right now, and the Russians want that shield cancelled. 

Will Obama cancel in order to get some other piece of paper with Moscow?  Lots of interrelated developments here.

July 6, 2009   Permalink

SUMMER AT THE KREMLIN AT 7:32 A.M. ET:  President Obama, the first lady, and a cast of thousands, have arrived in Moscow.  Great things are said to be in store.

The trip is grimly reminding some observers of President Kennedy's meeting with Nikita Khrushchev in Vienna in 1961.  Kennedy got badly rolled, something he admitted, and Khrushchev came away believing the new president was weak.  It's widely thought that this belief led directly to Moscow's attempt to place missiles in Cuba in late 1962, ushering in the Cuban Missile Crisis.

Now there are fears that another young president doesn't quite get the game.  Jennifer Rubin, writing in "Contentions," notes a New York Times piece reporting that Obama, as a college student, was enamored of the nuclear-freeze movement: 

Those who suspect the president is engaged in a bit of dangerous self-delusion and denial about certain unpleasant realities regarding the threats from rogue states won’t be heartened to read that his current non-proliferation fetish stems, at least according to the New York Times, from his college infatuation with the nuclear freeze movement. Apparently, youthful Obama did not focus on the results from Ronald Reagan’s refusal to buy into the fantasies of liberals –namely the fall of the Soviet Empire. That lesson has entirely eluded now-president Obama. Is it any wonder his critics find his posture fraught with peril and entirely out-of-touch with the threats we face?

As the Times reports:

“This is dangerous, wishful thinking,” Senator Jon Kyl, Republican of Arizona, and Richard Perle, an architect of the Reagan-era nuclear buildup that appalled Mr. Obama as an undergraduate, wrote last week in The Wall Street Journal. They contend that Mr. Obama is, indeed, a naïf for assuming that “the nuclear ambitions of Kim Jong-il or Mahmoud Ahmadinejad would be curtailed or abandoned in response to reductions in the American and Russian deterrent forces.”

COMMENT:  It's being reported that the U.S. and Russia are within range of an agreement to limit nuclear weapons and delivery systems.  Problem is, the Russians are insisting on a compromise in our plan to place missile defense systems in Eastern Europe as the price for the arms-reduction pact.

President Reagan turned down a similar demand from Mikhail Gorbachev, stunning the treaty-at-any-price crowd in Washington.  But Reagan's firmness on missile defense convinced the Soviets that this president could not be rolled and that the Cold War was essentially over, and that it was ending in an American victory.

President Obama seems incapable of embracing concepts like "victory," except when he's running for office.  We have reason to be concerned about what may be cooked up in this Moscow meeting.

July 6, 2009   Permalink