Obama: Turns Out I Am An Emperor!

Broadly
But accusations of a presidential abuse of power appear to have gained traction in recent days, as a Wall Street Journal/NBC News poll found just 38 percent support for Mr. Obama’s executive actions even as there was broad support for a path to citizenship for unauthorized immigrants. In the poll, 48 percent said they opposed Mr. Obama’s actions. Even a few Democrats have expressed concern about the propriety of the president’s actions. (New York Times, 11/21/2014)

Actually - if only 38% of the country supports Obama - he has lost more than "a few" Democrats. We wonder how many Democrats are quietly saying: "this guy is going to hurt our brand for years...." 


Zoned Out
I don’t know how ObamaCare will go, but it won’t last as it is. If the White House had wisdom, they’d declare that they’d won on the essential argument—health coverage is a right for all—and go back to the drawing board with Congress. The only part of the ObamaCare law that is popular is its intention, not its reality. The White House should declare victory and redraw the bill. But the White House is a wisdom-free zone. (Peggy Noonan, Wall Street Journal, 11/21/2014)

Another score for Noonan!


Wanted
People who wanted market-driven health care now have it in the Affordable Care Act (Alice M. Rivlin, Washington Post, 11/20/2014)

Completely dishonest analysis from Rivlin. Liberals do this all the time. They impose draconian rules and then talk about free markets. 


Inflation
President Barack Obama's much-touted 8 million Obamacare enrollment number was inflated by 1.3 million, the Obama administration now admits. "The mistake we made is unacceptable," tweeted Health and Human Services (HHS) Secretary Sylvia Burwell. "I will be communicating that clearly throughout the department." (Breitbart.com, 11/23/2014)

Is there anything that the Obama administration will not lie about? Answer: no. 


At Least
President Obama decided in recent weeks to authorize a more expansive mission for the military in Afghanistan in 2015 than originally planned, a move that ensures American troops will have a direct role in fighting in the war-ravaged country for at least another year. (New York Times, 11/21/2014)

Hey, don't get us wrong we think fighting the terrorists on their home turf is a good idea. But where is Code Pink? Where is the condemnation by the New York Times editors? Where is the rambling incoherent speech by Harry Reid on the Senate floor? Where is the reminder of how many soldiers have died already? Oh, and where are the apologies to George Bush and Dick Cheney?


Holy Holy Holy
McAllister points out that the usual separation-of-church-and-state crowd has been remarkably quiet about the president’s invocation of the Old Testament, that bloodiest and most patriarchal part of holy writ. “No scathing posts. No statement from the Freedom From Religious Foundation. Oh, right,” she says, “this is a Democratic president, so it’s okay.”(Ian Tuttle, nationalreview.com, 11/21/2014)

Killer point! Recall the endless criticism any time a Republican politician invokes religion. Liberal secularists are mute when Obama quotes scripture. 

Coming Soon from Democrats: The Republican War on Children!

Bernie Sanders: Keystone XL 'makes no sense to me' (Washington Examiner, 11/18/2014)

RedStateVT: Bernie Sanders 'makes no sense to us' (RedStateVT, 11/18/2014)


Currently
In the current Democratic-controlled Senate, Senator Harry Reid of Nevada, the majority leader, has long refused to bring a Keystone bill to a vote for fear that it could hurt the re-election chances of environmental-minded Democrats who might have voted against a project that is popular with many voters. (New York Times, 11/18/2014)

So to fellow bloggers who write endlessly of Republican obstructionism we forward the passage above. Turns out Harry Reid's Senate (which never passed a budget either, by the way) may have doing some obstruction of their own! Also nice to hear that the Keystone pipeline is "popular with many voters." We are guessing that said voters like jobs and low gas prices. 


Starkly
President Obama is poised to ignore stark warnings that executive action on immigration would amount to “violating our laws” and would be “very difficult to defend legally.”

Those warnings came not from Republican lawmakers but from Mr. Obama himself.

For years, he has waved aside the demands of Latino activists and Democratic allies who begged him to act on his own, and he insisted publicly that a decision to shield millions of immigrants from deportation without an act of Congress would amount to nothing less than the dictates of a king, not a president. (New York Times, 11/18/2014)

For any of you cynics out there, remember: Republicans flip flop, Democrats evolve.


Mutually
But since the Affordable Care Act was enacted in 2010, the relationship between the Obama administration and insurers has evolved into a powerful, mutually beneficial partnership that has been a boon to the nation’s largest private health plans and led to a profitable surge in their Medicaid enrollment. (New York Times, 11/17/2014)

During the Obamacare debate, Charles Krauthammer once famously said: "I care not a whit about the insurance companies." We agree. They sold their souls to Obama for short term profits but given the opportunity Obama will sell them out in a heartbeat.


Surely
As headlines go, “ Obama Moves Close to Calling Russian Action in Ukraine an Invasion,” from a weekend story in the New York Times , must surely rank among the year’s most revealing. The Obama presidency has long been at odds with the obvious. Once this was called hope.

Now it is generally recognized as farce. (Bret Stephens, Wall Street Journal, 11/17/2014)

Bret Stephens picks up on RedStateVT's recent point!


Extensively
Mr. Gruber wrote a 2011 cartoon book called “Health Care Reform” that aimed to explain the federal law. A note about the author says Mr. Gruber “consulted extensively with the Obama administration and Congress during the development” of the law. (Wall Street Journal, 11/17/2014)

Of all the egregious sins that Gruber has perpetrated, surely this is the worst: he wrote a cartoon book on Obamacare. 


And Then This
Here comes the tea party of the left. (Dana Milbank, Washington Post, 11/17/2014)

Honest column from Milbank. Yes, the Dems have a tea party too.

Keeping Score

Everything Old
The Obama administration is preparing to carry out a campaign against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria that may take three years to complete, requiring a sustained effort that could last until after President Obama has left office, according to senior administration officials. (New York Times, 9/8/2014)

President Obama's proposed military actions in the Middle East were met by boisterous objections from Dennis Kucinich, Bernie Sanders, Code Pink and Senator Barack Obama. 

Get it?


Price of Victory
Unilateral action by the president might undermine the prospects for bipartisan agreement on a broad immigration overhaul for years to come.

As the election draws closer, some nervous Senate Democrats have told White House officials that President Obama’s actions could cost them victory at the polls.

It was that concern, shared by members of Mr. Obama’s inner circle as well as other members of Congress, White House officials said, that ultimately prompted the president to break the promise he made on June 30 in the Rose Garden to act on his own before summer’s end to fix the immigration system. (New York Times, 9/8/2014)

Another broken promise! Is anyone out there keeping track...anyone?

And again, Obama will not act - at least for now - to implement a policy that if implemented would cause people not to vote for Democrats. Sounds like another winner.


Pointless
His (new Meet the Press host Chuck Todd) questions to President Obama were succinct and pointed, but Mr. Obama is not a rewarding guest in a one-on-one interview. He tends to give long, meditative and atonal answers that wear down listeners. (New York Times, 9/8/2014)

So Obama is boring and doesn't answer the question asked. Really? The greatest orator of this or any generation?


For Better or Worse
His policy is better than he has articulated it.... (E.J. Dionne, Jr., Washington Post, 9/3/2014)

Does Dionne even recognize the irony of what he writes? Obama the orator (the greatest of this or any generation - see above) is unable to 'articlulate' his foreign policy. 


Round Up
When President Obama addresses the nation on Wednesday to explain his plan to defeat Islamic extremists in Iraq and Syria, it is a fair bet he will not call them the “JV team.”

Nor does he seem likely to describe Iraq as “sovereign, stable and self-reliant” with a “representative government.” And presumably he will not assert after more than a decade of conflict that “the tide of war is receding.”

As he seeks to rally Americans behind a new military campaign in the Middle East, Mr. Obama finds his own past statements coming back to haunt him. Time and again, he has expressed assessments of the world that in the harsh glare of hindsight look out of kilter with the changed reality he now confronts. (New York Times, 9/9/2014)

Yes, that about sums it up. Thank you New York Times. It's true we are hard on you, but it feels so right and so honest when you get it correct.


Heartless
A new ABC News poll has nothing but heartache for Democrats and President Obama. By a wide margin of 52-42%, voters see President Obama as a failed president. Americans also see Obama as more of a divider than uniter. Only 38% believe President Obama is uniting the country. A majority of 55% believe he's dividing the country. (Breitbart.com, 9/9/2014)

And he is not yet halfway through his second term! Just think of how much further Obama has to fall. Let's hope Americans remember the next time they use the polls to elect novelty candidates. 

Sue for Peace

Everything Old
The Obama administration is preparing to carry out a campaign against the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria that may take three years to complete, requiring a sustained effort that could last until after President Obama has left office, according to senior administration officials. (New York Times, 9/8/2014)

President Obama's proposed military actions in the Middle East were met by boisterous objections from Dennis Kucinich, Bernie Sanders, Code Pink and Senator Barack Obama. 

Get it?


Price of Victory
Unilateral action by the president might undermine the prospects for bipartisan agreement on a broad immigration overhaul for years to come.

As the election draws closer, some nervous Senate Democrats have told White House officials that President Obama’s actions could cost them victory at the polls.

It was that concern, shared by members of Mr. Obama’s inner circle as well as other members of Congress, White House officials said, that ultimately prompted the president to break the promise he made on June 30 in the Rose Garden to act on his own before summer’s end to fix the immigration system. (New York Times, 9/8/2014)

Another broken promise! Is anyone out there keeping track...anyone?

And again, Obama will not act - at least for now - to implement a policy that if implemented would cause people not to vote for Democrats. Sounds like another winner.


Pointless
His (new Meet the Press host Chuck Todd) questions to President Obama were succinct and pointed, but Mr. Obama is not a rewarding guest in a one-on-one interview. He tends to give long, meditative and atonal answers that wear down listeners. (New York Times, 9/8/2014)

So Obama is boring and doesn't answer the question asked. Really? The greatest orator of this or any generation?


For Better or Worse
His policy is better than he has articulated it.... (E.J. Dionne, Jr., Washington Post, 9/3/2014)

Does Dionne even recognize the irony of what he writes? Obama the orator (the greatest of this or any generation - see above) is unable to 'articlulate' his foreign policy. 


Round Up
When President Obama addresses the nation on Wednesday to explain his plan to defeat Islamic extremists in Iraq and Syria, it is a fair bet he will not call them the “JV team.”

Nor does he seem likely to describe Iraq as “sovereign, stable and self-reliant” with a “representative government.” And presumably he will not assert after more than a decade of conflict that “the tide of war is receding.”

As he seeks to rally Americans behind a new military campaign in the Middle East, Mr. Obama finds his own past statements coming back to haunt him. Time and again, he has expressed assessments of the world that in the harsh glare of hindsight look out of kilter with the changed reality he now confronts. (New York Times, 9/9/2014)

Yes, that about sums it up. Thank you New York Times. It's true we are hard on you, but it feels so right and so honest when you get it correct.


Heartless
A new ABC News poll has nothing but heartache for Democrats and President Obama. By a wide margin of 52-42%, voters see President Obama as a failed president. Americans also see Obama as more of a divider than uniter. Only 38% believe President Obama is uniting the country. A majority of 55% believe he's dividing the country. (Breitbart.com, 9/9/2014)

And he is not yet halfway through his second term! Just think of how much further Obama has to fall. Let's hope Americans remember the next time they use the polls to elect novelty candidates. 

All This...and More!

Challenged
During an appearance on "The Daily Show," she (Kathleen Sebelius) addressed viewers crucial for the health program's success—young adults, whose participation is needed to spread the costs of care in the new system.

"We're going to do a challenge," host Jon Stewart said on the TV show. "I'm going to try and download every movie ever made, and you are going to try to sign up for Obamacare, and we'll see which happens first." (WSJ, 10/18/2013)

Loyal readers know that we are no fans of Jon Stewart, but this is hilarious. Good for him!

And then there is this from the same article:

Mrs. Sebelius has personal as well as professional interest in getting it to work. "My 29-year-old son is an entrepreneurial artist who is too old to be on his parents' plan but has a job that doesn't come with health insurance," she said. "So he is also going to be in the marketplace looking for coverage."

She plans to return home to Kansas this weekend, where she will navigate healthcare.gov with her son John, she said, "and see for myself every step of the way."

So it's October 18th. And Sebelius is saying that she hasn't even tried the healthcare website herself? RedStateVT reverses its previously held position that Sebelius should resign. It seems to us that if you oppose Obamacare, the best thing to do is to insist that she remain. 


Doormat
Separately, major American corporations like the Silicon Valley tech giants are once again preparing to intensify their campaign to persuade Congress to pass a comprehensive immigration law, an effort that has been dormant since late spring.

That will include a late-November “Hackathon” that will bring together executives and immigrants without work documents to contact members of Congress to push the cause. (NYT, 10/20,2013)

Sample script: "Hello Senator, my name is Manuel and I am in this country illegally...."

Distinct Advantages

The End of Civilization
At 11 on a weeknight earlier this year, her work finished, a slim, pretty junior at the University of Pennsylvania did what she often does when she has a little free time. She texted her regular hookup — the guy she is sleeping with but not dating. What was he up to? He texted back: Come over. So she did. They watched a little TV, had sex and went to sleep.

“We don’t really like each other in person, sober,” she said, adding that “we literally can’t sit down and have coffee.”

Ask her why she hasn’t had a relationship at Penn, and she won’t complain about the death of courtship or men who won’t commit. Instead, she’ll talk about “cost-benefit” analyses and the “low risk and low investment costs” of hooking up.

“I positioned myself in college in such a way that I can’t have a meaningful romantic relationship, because I’m always busy and the people that I am interested in are always busy, too,” she said.

“And I know everyone says, ‘Make time, make time,’ ” said the woman, who spoke on the condition of anonymity but agreed to be identified by her middle initial, which is A. “But there are so many other things going on in my life that I find so important that I just, like, can’t make time, and I don’t want to make time.”

It is by now pretty well understood that traditional dating in college has mostly gone the way of the landline, replaced by “hooking up” — an ambiguous term that can signify anything from making out to oral sex to intercourse — without the emotional entanglement of a relationship.

Until recently, those who studied the rise of hookup culture had generally assumed that it was driven by men, and that women were reluctant participants, more interested in romance than in casual sexual encounters. But there is an increasing realization that young women are propelling it, too. (NYT, 7/12/2013)

We read one page of this seven page New York Times article and got sick.  Here we have the logical endpoint of Liberalism, Feminism and Hollywood. 

--Never mind waiting until marriage to have sex. 

--Never mind having sex with your steady boyfriend. 

--Women are now free to have sex with men they don't even like.

War on women? Yes, indeed.


Spot On
House Republicans find themselves in a difficult spot on immigration, caught between the needs of the national party to broaden its appeal to Hispanics, and the views of constituents in gerrymandered, largely safe conservative districts. (NYT, 7/10/2013)

Hmmm...have we ever heard of "gerrymandered, largely safe LIBERAL districts?" 

The Times does not say whether they exist.


Standardized
The bill would ban abortions after 20 weeks of pregnancy and hold abortion clinics to the same standards as hospital-style surgical centers, among other requirements. Its supporters say that the strengthened requirements for the structures and doctors will protect women’s health; opponents argue that the restrictions are actually intended to put financial pressure on the clinics that perform abortions and will force most of them to shut their doors. (NYT, 7/13/2013)

A question for opponents of Texas's new abortion law: do you think that abortions should NOT be performed in clinics with highly qualified doctors and high standards of safety?


Stamped Out
Ms. Pelosi's anger must be especially amusing to House Speaker John Boehner, because the Democratic leader helped to defeat the original $1 trillion version of the farm bill last month. That version included some $740 billion for food stamps, but Democrats opted to kill it because they wanted even more money for a program whose cost more than doubled from 2008 to 2012. They objected to a modest GOP proposal to allow states to adopt pilot work requirements for able-bodied food-stamp recipients. (WSJ, 7/12/2013)

Always good to get the complete story, isn't it?

War Within a War

The Native Tongue
Years ago it was a joke in New York City that you could not get a native born American cab driver. It is such a fact of city life now that it is no longer elicits even a faint smile. New Yorkers accept it and for New Yorkers to accept something it has to mean that the system works. The immigrant cabbies speak passable English, know where things are and can get you where you need to go, albeit with some occasionally exciting rides.

Doing field research in Philadelphia this past weekend we had a different experience. Namely, the cab drivers do not speak English, at least not enough to communicate. Second, they do not seem to know the streets or landmarks of an historic city. We had an exciting adventure wherein the first cabbie of Middle Eastern origin drove us around for fifteen minutes unable to find our destination. Eventually he flagged down a fellow cabbie, of African origin, who also took us on an unintended tour of the city. 

So is this the state of the country today? We allow in people who cannot speak the language and cannot even do the jobs for which they are hired. Yeah, we certainly need immigration reform. But not the kind that Liberals imagine. 


Unguarded
This week, as Mr. Obama confronted a scandal frenzy unlike any he has faced, he let his guard down during fund-raisers in New York. “My thinking was after we beat them in 2012, well, that might break the fever,” he told donors. “And it’s not quite broken yet.” (NYT, 5/15/2013)

This is the secret narrative of Obama. Absent a super-majority he has neither the talent nor the will to get anything done. No recent president - not Clinton, not Bush - spent as much time complaining about how he is so hamstrung by having to deal with the other side. Obama is a weak and ineffectual leader. 

(You know things are bad for the president when the New York Times puts a story on the Obama scandals ahead of their 60-part series on sexual assaults in the military.)


Angry
President Obama announced Wednesday that Steve T. Miller, the acting commissioner of the IRS, had resigned in the wake of the controversy over the IRS's targeting of conservative groups. In an angry statement in the White House, Obama said the IRS’s actions were “inexcusable and Americans are right to be angry about it and I’m angry about it.” He added, “I will not tolerate this type of behavior in any agency but especially the IRS given the power it has and the reach it has.” (Washington Post, 5/15/2013)

Make no mistake about it. The president is.....angry. 

Previously he was outraged.