January 31, 2011
THE EGYPTIAN CONSTITUTION
I have to write a post about a post I was going to write because I don't grok.
At a press conference on Friday, President Obama said the following:
The people of Egypt have rights that are universal, that includes the right to peaceful assembly and association, the right to free speech, and the ability to determine their own destiny. These are human rights, and the United States will stand up for them everywhere.
My first thought was that the president was nuts, that Egyptians don't have these rights. Or at least they haven't secured them. I was going to write a long post about how these rights are indeed human rights, inalienable, endowed on us. Our Constitution does not
give us these rights, it simply enumerates them. Our government does not give us these rights, it is there to protect them. And that our Constitution begins with "We the people" because it is unique.
So I looked up the
Egyptian constitution and was surprised to read that it too begins with "We the people." I read further about freedom of speech and opinion and individual freedoms and just got more confused. Why was the president saying that Egyptians have these rights when
clearly they do not? And how can all these rights be enumerated in their constitution when it doesn't appear that they actually have them?
So where's the disconnect?
Was the president being lofty and speaking in idealistic generalities about humankind, or was he specifically stating that Egyptians are guaranteed these rights by their constitution and are being denied them unjustly?
And how can Egypt have a constitution that guarantees its citizens a "democratic, socialist state" and then have the same leader for 30 years?
I really don't grok.
Posted by: Sarah at
01:23 PM
| Comments (1)
| Add Comment
Post contains 294 words, total size 2 kb.
1
No kidding! This whole situation is very confusing. I'm glad I'm not the only one who is flummoxed.
Posted by: Lane at February 03, 2011 08:46 PM (u8biq)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
November 03, 2010
A WIN FOR THE COUNTRY
A European friend of mine was saying recently that she doesn't really understand how American government works because it doesn't make sense to her that our "parliament" could be of a different political party than our president. She wondered how anything would ever get done.
I tried to explain that the Founders of the United States intended it this way, that our system was created under the assumption that government works best when it governs least.
This result from last night, it should ensure the least amount of government. That's a good thing.
It's a win for the country.
Now leave us alone.
Posted by: Sarah at
09:33 AM
| Comments (2)
| Add Comment
Post contains 108 words, total size 1 kb.
1
it doesn't make sense to her that our "parliament" could be of a
different political party than our president. She wondered how anything
would ever get done.Checks and balances. Gridlock can sometimes be a good thing. And half-correct is preferable to a completely wrong consensus.
Posted by: Amritas at November 03, 2010 02:22 PM (5a7nS)
2
Perhaps that explains, in a nutshell, why Americans are unique... I think our system of checks and balances is the way to go, warts and all. It feels right.
Posted by: jck at November 04, 2010 11:20 AM (fRt6P)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
October 22, 2010
WHAT'S GOOD FOR THE GOOSE
I heard about this secondhand so perhaps I'm missing some nuance, but did Juan Williams just get fired for expressing basically the same thoughts that Barack Obama attributed to his typical white granny during the greatest speech on race relations since Martin Luther King?
Posted by: Sarah at
05:46 AM
| Comments (3)
| Add Comment
Post contains 49 words, total size 1 kb.
1
The difference is that Juan Williams admitted to having crimethoughts ... or should we say crime
feelings ("I get worried. I get nervous"), whereas The One was describing the crimefeelings of his grandmother. The One has never had a crimefeeling in his life. He is correctness personified. It is the mission of NPR to make the masses as correct as He is, to take their money and use it to indoctrinate them with correct thoughts for their own good. The sick should keep their crimethoughts to their
psychiatrists.
Posted by: kevin at October 22, 2010 12:56 PM (5a7nS)
2
Yes, he got fired for thinking what probably 95% of us think ... I think maybe the P in NPR should stand for something other than "Public"...
Posted by: Toni at October 23, 2010 07:07 AM (OoGre)
3
Ah, but Juan Williams was also working part-time at Fox. And is therefore evil. *shaking head*
Posted by: Lissa at October 25, 2010 08:40 AM (geun6)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
February 12, 2010
BARACK OBAMA HATES BLACK PEOPLE
R1 sent me a story that tears me in all directions:
Freeze on HIV spending sparks concern in AfricaOn the one hand, when we're borrowing so much money from China and we don't have
any money of our own, we need to cut spending. And cutting philanthropy to other nations ought to be, in my opinion, one of the first things to go.
On the other hand, I think Pres Obama needs to take some guff for this. You know, because George Bush hates black people...even though George Bush did more for Africa than anyone else ever has. And apparently more than the first black president plans to do.
So part of me thinks this program needs to be cut (though I am unclear if they're really cutting it or just diverting the funds in another direction) and the other part of me wants someone to slap Kanye West in the face with this article and force him to eat fishsticks.
Posted by: Sarah at
10:19 AM
| Comments (2)
| Add Comment
Post contains 167 words, total size 1 kb.
1
I'll watch the forced fish-stick eating =). This really burns me up--as you said, not so much the cutting of funds, because spend-less-than-you-make is such a basic principle, but because G. W. B. gets so much guff for everything (when he really did some pretty cool things) and B. H. O. gets off the hook for everything (when he's really doing some pretty crappy things).
Posted by: Lucy at February 12, 2010 12:40 PM (YNvUz)
2
BHO only half-hates black people.
In his defense, he does love wookies.
Posted by: Chuck at February 12, 2010 02:59 PM (bMH2g)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
January 28, 2010
CHIN DOWN
I didn't watch the entire State of the Union speech last night; I only caught the last 20 minutes. But what struck me the most in the instant I turned the TV on was something Mark Steyn
mentions:
One problem, as
Jay pointed out, is that upturned chin. Just as a
matter of angles, it looks wrong on TV. So it would be a problem for
Hillary or McCain or Ron Paul or whoever would have won. But it's worse
for Obama because it plays into the
aloof-and-arrogant
meme. I don't know why he does it. Are the prompters notched up a hole
too high? What's the deal? Why doesn't one of his supersmart advisers
get out the wrench and lower them?
He looks like a pompous ass when he speaks. That makes it hard not to hear everything he says through the pompous ass filter.
And I loved this Kevin Hassett
idea:
Watching him list one costly agenda item after another, I couldn’t help
feeling that we need a constitutional amendment that requires
politicians to start promises with the words “I want to take your money
and.†It might be that such a rule would constrain them, since I can’t
imagine anyone having the courage to say, “I want to take your money
and use it to pay off the college loan for that rich kid down the
block,†and “I want to take your money and use it to help your plumber
buy a new wrench.â€
Posted by: Sarah at
10:03 AM
| Comments (3)
| Add Comment
Post contains 250 words, total size 2 kb.
1
It's all so . . . frustrating!!!
Posted by: Lucy at January 28, 2010 11:58 AM (YNvUz)
2
I usually disagree with kevin, but I strongly agree with Kevin Hassett!
"I want to take your money" should be pronounced with the same Transylvanian accent as "I vant to drink your blood." Forget
Twilight - the government is the biggest vampire of all.
Hassett was really pulling his punches when choosing his examples: paying off college loans and buying new wrenches. I'm sure others can come up with more appalling examples of government waste.
The government is a virus for wealth and productivity. It wastes and wastes and wastes, and then it expects you to celebrate it for doing so. It doesn’t matter which party is in charge.-
onlyaliberal.com
Posted by: Amritas at January 28, 2010 12:01 PM (+nV09)
3
I loved both links. They seriously make me fall in love with reading posts on my phone when I should be falling.
And I think you could add "his Ivy League college degree while you work full time and take one class per semester for your degree from the online college."
I read a Howard Zinn quote on Big Something (I forget) where he was listing all the forces for good and evil and how America needs to never go to war and always be on the good side. One of the either/or groups was capitalists and workers. Sure some big bad evil capitalists might have come from a house full of money, but in what world did the majority of them get to where they are without WORKing. Doesn't it make sense that they feel ownership for the things the WORKed to achieve. It is that sense that all capitalists are some kind of evil do nothing high atop the mountain spitting at and whipping and theiving from those below that irks the crap out of me. I think a work ethic is something that capitalists value. And it sure beats the pants off the gimme ethic that pervades the message given by The O.
It isn't that they want fairness and righteous equality. They want to be the ones high atop the mountain spitting and whipping and theving from their lessors.
"It's common sense." <--- SOTU quote
Posted by: wifeunit at January 28, 2010 12:52 PM (4B1kO)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
January 27, 2010
BEYOND SILLY
I knew all the teleprompter jokes already and had just taken them as lighthearted ribbing, but this is getting ridiculous. A teleprompter for the elementary school? And now
this...for a briefing with like 15 people? Wow. It's beyond silly now. It's frightening how this man cannot speak without TOTUS.
Posted by: Sarah at
08:27 PM
| Comments (1)
| Add Comment
Post contains 51 words, total size 1 kb.
1
We're heard all the Obama conspiracy theories: that he's the Manchurian Candidate, a secret Muslim born in Kenya, etc.,
ad nauseam. They're all nonsense. Here's a new one that's more, um, plausible: Could TOTUS be from outer space? Are we being taken over by alien life forms resembling teleprompters? These creatures obviously don't have a clue about what many Americans want.
Posted by: Amritas at January 28, 2010 11:54 AM (+nV09)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
January 26, 2010
OBAMA'S HALLIBURTON
How's that CHANGE working out for you?
Democrats Can Dole Out No-Bid Contracts, Too
Posted by: Sarah at
12:03 PM
| Comments (3)
| Add Comment
Post contains 16 words, total size 1 kb.
1
Yes, we can ... to green, diverse companies for a good cause ("train the next generation of legal professionals" ...
our kind of people, presumably specializing in sharia*). Bidding is so capitalist. The USSR didn't need bidding, and neither does the USSA. Once again, we do what the Dubya regime did, and it's OK because we have noble intentions that they lacked.
*
The sacred basis of the constitution of Afghanistan (emphasis ours):
Courts are allowed to use Hanafi jurisprudence in situations where the Constitution lacks provisions.A system of civil law is described, but no law may contradict the beliefs and provisions of Islam. It was widely reported that Sharia law is not specifically mentioned, but in fact Hanafi jurisprudence is one of the six branches of Sharia law.[...]
There is no mention of freedom of conscience, and in fact apostasy from Islam is punishable by death (see below).
The constitution's provisions on religion drew international controversy in 2006, when Afghan citizen Abdul Rahman, a convert to Christianity, was threatened with the death penalty for apostasy. Rahman was released under international pressure on the theory that he was insane and that the case against him had "investigative gaps," and found asylum in Italy. The constitution itself was not changed in response.
Why change it? It is Islamic. Perfect.
Your tax dollars are training the next generation of sharia experts.
Posted by: kevin at January 26, 2010 01:21 PM (+nV09)
2
My favorite part is that the goal is to infect the country with lawyers. Of all things. Because everything is better with 25 million dollars worth of instruction and oversight by lawyers. He was as full of shite as the rest of them. No amount of eau de roses will ever cover it up.
Posted by: wifeunit at January 26, 2010 01:24 PM (4B1kO)
Posted by: Pamela at January 27, 2010 03:34 AM (NpCt7)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
January 21, 2010
BUT BUSH DID IT
Raise your hand if you're sick and tired of the Democrats using the but-we-have-to-undo-eight-years-of-Bush excuse for everything... If we were playing a drinking game, we'd all be hammered.
I was too young to pay attention, but did Reagan do this? Did Reagan gripe and moan about how he had to fix everything Carter had screwed up? I mean, he campaigned right in the middle of a hostage situation, for heaven's sake. Was his excuse for everything "but Carter did it"? I don't see how Obama thinks we're buying his line that Bush doubled the deficit, so it's OK for him to quadruple it.
And then there's
this, via Oda Mae:
And, it turns out that the president
received a high-level briefing
just three days before said crotch bomber attack about possible holiday
period terrorist attacks against the U.S. I suppose we could say, “Give
the guy a break. He’s only been in office a year.†Yet GWB hadn’t been
in office a year, and he was relentlessly berated for not stopping 9/11
before it happened, with critics citing the fact that he
received a briefing while on vacation a month before, warning that Osama bin Laden and company were planning on hijacking a U.S. airliner.
Bush was handed a mess in the Middle East by Bill Clinton, yet he didn't go on TV constantly after 9/11 and talk about how it was all Clinton's fault. When we lost bin Laden, Bush didn't constantly remind the American public that Clinton had once had the chance to get him, so really it was all Clinton's fault.
Ugh, give it a rest already. You've been president for a year; it's your show now. Start acting like a grown-up.
Posted by: Sarah at
08:50 AM
| Comments (3)
| Add Comment
Post contains 289 words, total size 2 kb.
Posted by: Amber at January 21, 2010 11:07 AM (facQk)
2
History began in late 2000. Bush was given a pristine blank slate and spray-painted "W" on it. The Republican red paint won't disappear until long after the reign of President Sasha Obama, fourth of the Obama Dynasty.
According to Obama I, Bush is the reason that Scott Brown was elected:
"Here's my assessment of not just the vote in Massachusetts, but the mood around the country: the same thing that swept Scott Brown into office swept me into office," the president said in an exclusive interview with ABC News' George Stephanopoulos. "People are angry and they are frustrated. Not just because of what's happened in the last year or two years, but what's happened over the last eight years."Bush is the universal motive, the motor of the world. His momentum continues to hurl Gaia toward disaster, despite Obama's heroic efforts.
Posted by: kevin at January 21, 2010 01:07 PM (+nV09)
3
I gotta "amen" the "amen".
You are so right, Sarah.
The maternity pic is beautiful, btw.
I, too, loved being pregnant. Won't hold a candle to meeting her, though.
Nicki
Posted by: Nicki at January 21, 2010 11:56 PM (fqQct)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
January 10, 2010
MALAPROPISMS
A good
comment over at American Thinker:
I heard Obama use this phrase the other day: "intimately passionate".
Seems strange, as the accepted way to convey that meaning would be to say "deeply passionate", and the adjective deeply would be the proper one required by any copy editor.
And remember when Obama said "...calibrate my words". All the William Safire (RIP) types fell out of their chairs.
So, is Obama the master of malapropisms, the Norm Crosby of national politics?
I remember being completely befuddled by "calibrate my words." Didn't Bush get an enormous amount of grief for every vocabulary misuse? And even the invention of the word Bushisms? Obama's just as bad.
Posted by: Sarah at
08:26 AM
| Comments (5)
| Add Comment
Post contains 114 words, total size 1 kb.
1
Obama's just as bad.Silly Sarah!! Everyone knows that Bush was an idiot and Obama is a genius. Now be a good girl and drink your Kool-Aid.
Posted by: Lissa at January 10, 2010 12:42 PM (mgjM7)
2
I don't think those words mean what he thinks they mean.
Posted by: airforcewife at January 10, 2010 01:38 PM (uE3SA)
3
Found the following gaffes elsewhere. It's amazing that he's allowed outside without a helmet.
"UPS and FedEx are doing just fine, right? It's the Post Office that's
always having problems." –attempting to make the case for
government-run healthcare, while simultaneously undercutting his own
argument, Portsmouth, N.H., Aug. 11, 2009
"The reforms we seek would bring greater competition, choice, savings
and inefficiencies to our health care system." --in remarks after a
health care roundtable with physicians, nurses and health care
providers, Washington, D.C., July 20, 2009
"It was also interesting to see that political interaction in Europe is
not that different from the United States Senate. There's a lot of -- I
don't know what the term is in Austrian, wheeling and dealing."
--confusing German for "Austrian,"
Strasbourg, France, April 6, 2009
"Let me be absolutely clear. Israel is a strong friend of Israel's. It
will be a strong friend of Israel's under a McCain...administration. It
will be a strong friend of Israel's under an Obama administration. So
that policy is not going to change." --Amman, Jordan, July 22, 2008
"How's it going, Sunshine?" --campaigning in Sunrise, Florida
"On this Memorial Day, as our nation honors its unbroken line of fallen
heroes -- and I see many of them in the audience here today -- our
sense of patriotism is particularly strong."
"I've now been in 57 states -- I think one left to go." --at a campaign event in Beaverton, Oregon
"The point I was making was not that Grandmother harbors any racial
animosity. She doesn't. But she is a
typical white person, who, if she
sees somebody on the street that she doesn't know, you know, there's a
reaction that's been
bred in our experiences that don't go away and
that sometimes come out in the wrong way, and that's just the nature of
race in our society." (EMPHASIS ADDED)
"In case you missed it, this week, there was a tragedy in Kansas. Ten
thousand people died -- an entire town destroyed." --on a Kansas
tornado that killed 12 people
“There was something stirring across the country because of what
happened in Selma, Alabama, because some folks are willing to march
across a bridge. So they got together and Barack Obama Jr. was born.â€
(Obama was born in 1961 and the Selma march was in 1965)
“If they [his daughters] make a mistake, I don’t want them punished with a baby.â€
“My father served in World War II, and when he came home, he got the
services that he needed.†(At the end of WWII, Obama’s father was 10
years old.)
New T-Shirt Ideas:
"Punished with a baby" maternity shirt
"Typical White Person"
"I don't speak Austrian"
Posted by: Chuck Z at January 10, 2010 08:07 PM (bMH2g)
4
Thanks to Chuck Z for the list. Obama is just being honest in the first two!
I think even "deeply passionate" isn't a good choice of words because it's redundant. Is anyone
shallowly passionate?
I understood "calibrate my words" without any problems.
Merriam-Webster lists one definition of "calibrate" as "to adjust precisely for a particular function".
We forgive or even embrace the word choices of our friends and reflexively reject those of our foes. If a Republican had said those words, they might have been lauded as a fresh metaphor. But Obama said them, so they are forever tainted.
Who wants to sound like Obama?
John T. Reed analyzed Obama's speaking techniques:
As an erstwhile professional speaker, who has often been at conventions where I was one of many speakers and I listened to them as well, I know many of the tricks of the speaking trade. Obama’s reputation as a great speaker actually stems mainly from his use of several cheap speaker tricks.[...]
Don’t hold your breath waiting for the book The Wit of Obama.[...]
JFK, FDR, Lincoln, and Reagan are highly regarded as great orators. They said many memorable things. Even with the best available speech writers and now five years as a U.S. Senator and President, Obama has said nothing memorable.I disagree. Obama has said a few things that are memorable ... for the wrong reasons.
Posted by: Amritas at January 15, 2010 04:03 PM (+nV09)
5
Of course I *understood* the phrase; I meant I didn't understand where it came from. It's not a real expression. I still don't think I'd accept "calibrate" when applied to words/speech from a Republican. Maybe from a nonnative speaker.
Posted by: Sarah at January 15, 2010 07:23 PM (gWUle)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
December 30, 2009
TRANSPARENCY
From the administration that pledged total
transparency:
The Obama administration’s handling of the Christmas Day terror plot
has been “schizophrenic†says [Rep. Peter King]. “It’s reflective of their handling
of other incidents. They still haven’t given us any information on Fort
Hood. Even with the gate crashers, they’ve refused to give us on
information on communications between the White House social secretary
and the Secret Service. They’re giving us nothing and Democrats in
Congress are very reluctant to have any meaningful investigations.â€
Politics, not national security, is driving these decisions, says King.
“They’re holding back because they don’t want to share embarrassing
material.â€
Posted by: Sarah at
09:15 AM
| Comments (3)
| Add Comment
Post contains 102 words, total size 1 kb.
1
The O administration *is* transparent. We can see right through it. But millions remain blind.
Posted by: Amritas at December 30, 2009 10:33 AM (Dr0JC)
2
OTOH, the administration is so opaque that even an MSM reporter can't see through it:
http://www.dianawest.net/Home/tabid/36/EntryId/1186/White-House-Stonewalling-on-Obamas-Executive-Order-Unleashing-Interpol.aspx
http://michellemalkin.com/2009/12/29/the-interpol-question/
Posted by: Amritas at December 30, 2009 12:33 PM (J1wk+)
3
If that categorize as a Secret Service, so that means no transparency, of course. What do you expect from a Secret Service?
kjghjk.Transparent to the public and press? Dream on man. The O's are hiding behind the word "Secret Ops". All his policy is Secret Operation, so there are no need for the public to know about it.
Posted by: Shandra at January 18, 2010 12:55 AM (vOByA)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
November 05, 2009
DID HE WANT TO WIN OR LEAD?
I've heard and read many discussions on whether Pres Obama has got us in this handbasket on purpose or on accident. But I think this is an
interesting twist to the question:
Jim Vicevich at the link thinks that Obama has a core set of
principles that run to the hard Left, but has kept them hidden thus
far. Why? Jim argues that Obama couldn’t get elected on those
principles, and so he has kept them hidden while pushing them through
his legislative agenda.
Actually, I think Todd is closer to it. Obama wanted to be
President, not to lead, but just to win. Now that he has won, he has
no core set of governing principles other than what impacts Barack
Obama. He has offered no leadership on any part of his agenda all year
long, content to have Nancy Pelosi run it for him. His foreign policy
thus far consists entirely of making himself personally popular with
the world. On Afghanistan, Obama has thus far allowed Robert Gates and
David Petraeus to make his decisions, only balking at the moment
because the McChrystal strategy puts him at odds with his base, which
could erode his popularity.
Does Barack Obama have deeply-held principles that he wanted to apply to the country, or did he just want to be president?
Posted by: Sarah at
08:24 AM
| Comments (1)
| Add Comment
Post contains 227 words, total size 2 kb.
1
The absurd part is that one year in we have no idea what the answer to that question is! My impression so far is that he thinks it's good to be king.
If he had been serious about achieving any of his goals, he'd have had plans ready to go. I mean, if you've been working your whole adult life to be in charge and change things - wouldn't you have a blueprint in your head of how to do it once you're actually in charge. Hell, I've got blueprints and I'll never be in charge!
Posted by: Beth at November 05, 2009 10:42 AM (ZT9NN)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
November 02, 2009
RESTORING ZELAYA
I think if I had to choose the most appalling thing Pres Obama has done since taking office, his insistence on the restoration of Manuel Zelaya would have to be it.
It sickens me.
The essential elements of the agreement had largely been worked out months ago by other Latin American leaders. If Congress agrees, Mr. Zelaya will serve out the remaining three months of his term, and the presidential election scheduled for Nov. 29 will be recognized by all sides.
Mr. Zelaya and Mr. Micheletti, both members of the Liberal Party, are not candidates.
Some significant obstacles remain, not least of which is the approval of the nation’s Congress, which voted overwhelmingly to strip Mr. Zelaya of power four months ago and now has to decide whether to reinstate him.
“That is going to be the issue that is most provocative internally,†said
Assistant Secretary of State Thomas A. Shannon Jr., who led the American delegation, “and probably where we in the international community are going to have to pay the closest attention.â€
I hope the Honduran Congress sticks to their guns.
Can you imagine if in 2000, European countries had gotten together and decided that, despite the constitutionality of Bush's victory, Al Gore should've been the rightful president? And cut off aid and visas to Americans? (OK, aid doesn't really work as well, but for argument's sake.) I mean really, can you imagine if the rest of the world told us that, our Constitution be damned, we had to do what they all said?
I love this sentence, about the immediate aftermath of Zelaya's booting:
Latin American countries, concerned about the precedent the coup had set in a region where democracy remained fragile, criticized the United States for sending mixed signals to Honduras.
Yes, I'm sure they did. Places like Venezuela would definitely be concerned about the precedent of following the rule of law.
Really, I think this is the most disgusting thing the Obama administration has done.
From the comments:
I wonder: If the people of Zimbabwe managed to throw out Mugabe, would
the US also demand he be put back in power simply because it was a
"coup"?
Posted by: Sarah at
10:42 PM
| No Comments
| Add Comment
Post contains 364 words, total size 3 kb.
October 25, 2009
THE BADNESS OF OBAMA JUST KEEPS GETTING WORSE
Powerline got an
email from Kristofer Harrison, who helped with the Bush administration's Afghanistan review. He says Cheney was right and that they did loads of work that they passed on, no strings attached, to Obama.
The Chicago mob's behavior is unbelievably unseemly. Here they were
given an immense amount of material, a complete strategic review and
plan with the author's heading left blank. President Bush felt it was
his duty to do so. And all Obama can do is smear president Bush, even
after he filled his own name into the author's column.
Read the whole thing.
P.S. Yes, what airforcewife said. See comments.
Posted by: Sarah at
08:38 AM
| Comments (1)
| Add Comment
Post contains 113 words, total size 1 kb.
1
And that is historically way nicer than outgoing administrations have been, too. When the Clinton Administration left, in addition to various pieces of furniture and what-not, they also took all the "w" keys from the computer keyboards.
I'm torn between thinking that is funny and rolling my eyes (it really was rather clever in the grand scheme of hazing), since it is sort of a tradition to do something when one loses (the Ford Administration threw peanuts everywhere when they left).
The fact that the W administration acted classy and as befits a leader leaving office during wartime speaks volumes in the presence of such a tradition and in light of what was done when they came into office.
The fact that the Obama administration refuses to cop to anything that was done for them just underscores what seems to be a feeling of entitlement and nastiness. Like "Heathers" in the White House.
Posted by: airforcewife at October 25, 2009 10:39 AM (uE3SA)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
October 24, 2009
"HOW COULD THIS BE THE SAME BUMBLING KLUTZ?"
Bush vindicated during visit to city
Posted by: Sarah at
06:41 PM
| Comments (2)
| Add Comment
Post contains 14 words, total size 1 kb.
1
Thanks Sarah! It was neat to read that!
Posted by: Stacy at October 25, 2009 01:19 AM (JKqIL)
2
I wonder what it feels like to be wrong about Pres. Bush …and Iraq, Gitmo, government controlled health care, bailouts, the Stimulis…how’s it feel Pres. Obama?
Posted by: tim at October 27, 2009 02:21 PM (nno0f)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
October 11, 2009
HE WON WHAT?
While at my grandmother's, I had dial-up for a few days. And then, we exhausted her monthly usage. Take a moment and turn your mental clock back waaay to when you paid per minute and only got a certain number of hours per month. On dial-up. Oy. We knocked it out in no time flat. So come Wednesday morning, I had no more internet for the week.
Friday my husband called and said that he didn't have access either, though for a sadder reason than I. He then said that he thought a buddy was pulling his leg by saying that Pres Obama had won the Nobel Peace Prize.
I was at the lunch table with several relatives. I could've asked them if they'd heard about this news, but honestly,
I thought it was too absurd to repeat out loud. I would've felt more serious asking, "Hey, have you guys heard that some people see Elvis at 7-11?" I mean, I just thought it was too stupid to repeat.
Really.
I hung up the phone and everyone at the table wondered what my husband had asked me about. So I had to say it.
And then found out it was true.
Let me repeat for emphasis: I thought the mere fact of
asking my relatives if Pres Obama had won the Nobel Peace Prize was
too embarrassing.
Imagine my embarrassment when I found out he did.
Man, I missed a good day to be on the internet. I hear people had
mad jokes.
Posted by: Sarah at
04:44 PM
| Comments (6)
| Add Comment
Post contains 256 words, total size 2 kb.
1
I'm pretty sure he's got American Girl of the Year locked up as well. That one's pretty cool, because you get a doll and a storybook made about you and marketed at all the American Girl Doll stores and online.
Posted by: airforcewife at October 11, 2009 05:50 PM (9sMSe)
2
I wish he would've declined it. He hasn't done anything to deserve it. I think he would've earned a lot more respect by declining it like a few others before him. I thought it was a joke too.
Posted by: Sara at October 11, 2009 09:54 PM (mjMky)
3
Even many of my liberal friends were making "Seriously?" and "What for?" -type comments on facebook.
Posted by: leofwende at October 11, 2009 10:10 PM (28CBm)
4
Build-A-Bear has the First Dog, so an American Girl doll seems terribly likely really...
Posted by: wifeunit at October 12, 2009 11:25 AM (4B1kO)
5
I couldn't believe this and ranted on Facebook about it that entire day. It's more so a reflection of the out-of-touch elitists in the world who mainly compromise the NPP committee (big surprise).
Personally, I thought this year was Morgan Tsvangirai's year - you know from stopping a tyrannical dictator from committing genocide and mass mutilation against his own people. But, eh, what do I know. As they said on Ace of Spades - the other nominees didn't have their own cover on People magazine, so there naysayers.
To lighten my mood, I took one narcissistic village (aka Hollywood) idiot and pitted him against our Emperor with No Clothes in Chief. Thus the beauty of Photoshop in our everyone-has-an-unsolicited-opinion age of society: "Kayne West Finally Properly Interrupts An Acceptance Speech" http://tinyurl.com/ylz3dvh
Posted by: BigD78 at October 12, 2009 02:09 PM (W3XUk)
6
LOL.... I love this line: "I thought the mere fact of asking my relatives if Pres Obama had won the Nobel Peace Prize was too embarrassing."
HOW TRUE!
Posted by: AFSister at October 16, 2009 03:53 PM (mUuHm)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
October 02, 2009
"SPOIL THE IMAGE OF SUCCESS"
Krauthammer:
On September 24, Obama ostentatiously presided over the Security
Council. With 14 heads of state (or government) at the table, with an
American president in the chair for the first time ever, with every
news camera in the world trained on the meeting, it would
garner unprecedented worldwide attention.
Unknown to the world,
Obama had in his pocket explosive revelations about an illegal
uranium-enrichment facility that the Iranians had been hiding near Qom.
The French and the British were urging him to use this most dramatic of
settings to stun the world with the revelation and to call for
immediate action.
Obama refused. Not only did he say nothing about it, but, reports Le Monde, Sarkozy was forced to scrap the Qom section of his
speech. Obama held the news until a day later — in Pittsburgh. I’ve got
nothing against Pittsburgh (site of the G-20 summit), but
a stacked-with-world-leaders Security Council chamber, it is not.
Why
forgo the opportunity? Because Obama wanted the Security
Council meeting to be about his own dream of a nuclear-free world. The
president, reports the New York Times, citing “White House officials,†did not want to “dilute†his disarmament resolution “by diverting to Iran.â€
Diversion?
It’s the most serious security issue in the world. A diversion from
what? From a worthless U.N. disarmament resolution?
Yes. And from Obama’s star turn as planetary visionary: “The administration told the French,†reports the Wall Street Journal, “that it didn’t want to ‘spoil the image of success’ for Mr. Obama’s debut at the U.N.â€
"Spoil the
image of success." Not
real success, but the image.
Our president is a narcissist.
Posted by: Sarah at
08:28 AM
| Comments (4)
| Add Comment
Post contains 278 words, total size 2 kb.
1
You know I heart Krauthammer.
And, "narcissist" is about the nicest word I could think of to end your final sentence.
Posted by: Guard Wife at October 02, 2009 08:34 AM (EvsXa)
2
WOW. Just WOW.
On second thought, I'll say a little more - it's one thing to choose your presentation style; it's quite another to presume to censor world-affecting information to manipulate the news.
Posted by: Krista at October 02, 2009 11:45 AM (sUTgZ)
3
The image is all Obama needs. No matter what he actually does, he will retire in 2012 or 2016 and live well. We Great Leaders don't have to care about consequences. We only care about ourselves.
We expect the world to bow down before our great Selves:
As a narcissist, Obama’s idea to solve the problems of the world is
to charm his opponents with his personal charisma ...
Obama thinks that if he ingratiates the rogue leaders of the world
they will all set aside their hostility against America and become
friends. Then he can shine and triumphantly prove to the world that he
is a messiah, with wisdom far surpassing other leaders and thus be
hailed as the ONE who ended the wars and established the Kingdom on
Earth.
Of course any sane person knows that these are juvenile thinkings.
Since the masses of people are simply naïve, they were swayed by such
demagogy and thought he really can perform miracles. Narcissists are
very confident of themselves. That is the source of their charisma. The
problem is that their confidence stems from their inability to separate
facts from fantasy.
For Obama - and for his devotees - image is reality. Image overcomes reality:
He [Obama] is not the Word made flesh, but the triumph of word over flesh, over color, over despair.
- Ezra Klein
Flesh is physical. But words don't need real world referents. We Great Leaders can and do say anything we want. When you starve, we celebrate a harvest.When you lose battles, we proclaim victory. And millions of you will support us no matter what. Millions will vote for us. Willingly. We love democracy because it is dumb-ocracy. We tell the masses what they want to hear and they buy it. They believe in "the triumph of word over flesh" - in magic.
Don't be fooled by iPods. Men are still cavemen, ready to obey anyone who acts like a chief, or in modern parlance, 'acts presidential'. Obama is an actor.
Actors can be narcissists. The public reinforces their 'greatness' by praising them instead of the director, the screenwriter, and all the many others who make our 'entertainment'. These 'mere' nonactors are the equivalent of the faceless capitalists who power the nation that Obama rules. Who cares about them when there is the One who makes us feel so good? In Klein's words,
Obama's finest speeches do not excite. They do not inform. They don't even really inspire. They elevate.
They enmesh you in a grander moment, as if history has stopped flowing
passively by, and, just for an instant, contracted around you, made you
aware of its presence and your role in it.
Can McCain do that? No wonder he lost.
We live in an Oprah world where feelings matter more than facts. We Great Leaders manipulate both. As long as you're on an emotional high, you won't think. You won't notice that Eastasia is our ally/enemy/whatever today even though it wasn't yesterday. You'll conveniently forget about Rev. Wright, about Ayers, about all those inconvenient truths even Al Gore won't mention.
But you haven't forgotten, have you? You still remember. Remember this prediction:
The narcissistic leader prefers the sparkle and glamour of
well-orchestrated illusions to the tedium and method of real
accomplishments, His reign is all smoke and mirrors, devoid of
substances, consisting of mere appearances and mass delusions. In the
aftermath of his regime - the narcissistic leader having died, been
deposed, or voted out of office - it all unravels.
- Sam Vaknin
Posted by: kevin at October 02, 2009 01:16 PM (+nV09)
4
Why on earth did Sarkozy go along with this? He's not one of Obama's employees.
In 1936, when the Germans moved troops into the Rhineland in defiance of treaty, French officials debated a military response. One of the arguments made *against* was that the United States wouldn't like it.
Allies should be treated with respect, but there are times a country's gotta do what it's gotta do.
Posted by: david foster at October 02, 2009 01:59 PM (uWlpq)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
September 18, 2009
OBAMA THE UNILATERALIST
Barack Obama, 2008:
I want to use all elements of American
power to keep us safe, and prosperous, and free. Instead of alienating
ourselves from the world, I want America - once again - to lead.
As President, I will pursue a
tough, smart and principled national security strategy - one that
recognizes that we have interests not just in Baghdad, but in Kandahar
and Karachi, in Tokyo and London, in Beijing and Berlin.
What about Prague and Warsaw?
The Poles and Czechs are scared. And
mad.
An editorial in Hospodarske Novine, a respected pro-business Czech
newspaper, said: "an ally we rely on has betrayed us, and exchanged us
for its own, better relations with Russia, of which we are rightly
afraid."
So we elected Obama to end the era of unilateralism, to mend fences with alienated allies and make the world love and respect us again.
Except for the Eastern bloc, who backed George Bush. They can get bent.
[Polish Prime Minister] Tusk did not sound pleased with Obama's announcement, telling Polish radio on Thursday,
"It was an autonomous decision taken by President Barack Obama" that did not involve the Polish government.
That sounds pretty unilateral to me.
I remain flabbergasted that my president keeps siding with people like Zelaya and Putin. Unbelievable.
Posted by: Sarah at
05:33 PM
| Comments (2)
| Add Comment
Post contains 214 words, total size 2 kb.
1
Neville Chamberlain comes to mind...
Posted by: Carrie at September 19, 2009 07:34 AM (HdP+f)
2
The Neville Chamberlain comparison is one that many people are using these days, but it's really unfair--to Chamberlain, that is.
Although Chamberlain pursued a very unwise policy of appeasement, he also hedged this policy by supporting the buildup of Britain's defenses...including production of the Spitfire & Hurricane fighters and the deployment of the world's first radar-based air defense network.
Had Chamberlain fully shared Obama's attitudes on defense, these systems never would have made it out of the design offices, and Britain would probably have lost the war.
Posted by: david foster at September 19, 2009 08:14 AM (uWlpq)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
September 15, 2009
IT'S ALL ABOUT HIM
At
PowerLine: "Obama seems increasingly unable to resist the kind of specious
arguments a fairly bright first year law student might make in a crunch." Oy.
Posted by: Sarah at
07:20 AM
| No Comments
| Add Comment
Post contains 30 words, total size 1 kb.
August 15, 2009
WHAT A DIFFERENT WORLD WE LIVE IN...
A section at the end of the book
Showdown:
The president should remind Americans that for over a century, the country somehow managed to survice without government regulatory oversight. It wasn't until 1887 that the first independent regulatory commission -- the Interstate Commerce Commission -- was established.
Congress authorized monies to extend the Cumberland Road, a roadway that ran from Cumberland, Maryland, to Wheeling, West Virginia. James Monroe, our nation's fifth president, used the only veto of his presidency to defeat the congressional bill, arguing that the road's extension should not be done by the federal government but by the states it passed through—present-day Pennsylvania, Virginia, Ohio, Indiana, and Illinois.
[...]
Franklin Pierce, our fourteenth president, in 1854 vetoed a bill to help the mentally ill saying, "I cannot find any authority in the Constitution for public charity," adding that to approve such spending "would be contrary to the letter and the spirit of the Constitution and subversive to the whole theory upon which the Union of these States is founded."
President Grover Cleveland, our twenty-second and twenty-fourth president, in 1887, said when vetoing an appropriation to help drought-stricken counties in Texas, "I feel obligated to withhold my approval of the plan to indulge in benevolent and charitable sentiment through the appropriate of public funds...I find no warrant for such appropriation in the Constitution."
We've come a long way, baby...
And what high hopes Larry Elder had for President Bush. Would that he had been the man Elder hoped he was.
Posted by: Sarah at
01:17 PM
| Comments (4)
| Add Comment
Post contains 257 words, total size 2 kb.
1
Pierce/Cleveland 2012!!! ;-)
And wow, yes... how far we've come...
Posted by: Krista at August 15, 2009 01:56 PM (sUTgZ)
2
It really does seem that we've come to the point in our republic that we are witnessing the dying days of the country. The USA will probably outlast our meager lifetimes, but it really seems that the trend is already set where the populace is already willing to destroy the principles that are the foundation of freedom in order to gain a few 'free' trinkets.
History moves faster these days with the advent of lightspeed communication, will the downfall of the US take as long as the downfall of Rome, or will our demise move faster given the speed of the modern world?
I for one am glad I know how to produce my own food, and am a crack shot with any firearm you put in front of me.
Posted by: John at August 15, 2009 04:19 PM (H4a70)
3
My husband wrote this petition for our local group to use. We are still groping for our mission statement, etc. I think it is a very good start for them, I hope they will use it.
http://rockportconservatives.blogspot.com/2009/08/please-read-print-study-and-consider.html
It is basically, let's make them get back to the constitution.
Posted by: Ruth H at August 16, 2009 11:07 AM (CvvEA)
4
I simply cannot imagine why we as a country, today in 2009, would like to encourage such destructive sentiments as those espoused by these dead selfish hypocrits who actually argued against public charity!! Why does anyone feel good about that? How can anyone feel good about that?? Would you want your neighbor to ignore your child being kidnapped? Or your spouse being brutally beaten? Or your own house being ransacked?? Then why argue against doing anything for suffering citizenry out of the funds we all contribute to in an effort to keep us all afloat?
Pure Capitalism's goal is its own self promotion, self propagation, and if the people engaging in its activities do not take measures to check its progression it will destroy all who fall under its tread. That is a fact. When we "allow the market" to do as it will, we have The Jungle, we have poisoned lands that cannot be used for hundreds of years because of pollution, we have rampant death and destruction. Why? Because the strictures of Pure Capitalism and the Market make no provision for human beings. In the perfect market-driven end game, we would all die, leaving about 10people alive who have all the money and reside on the fraction of land not completely inutile. I worked in urban planning and studied urban developement and sat in on the meetings: trust me, the uninhibited end is always the same.
The dying days of our country will arrive if we continue to believe that there is no need to care for the needs/health/wellbeing of anyone the market does not tell us to. We will die as a country if we continue to believe that what keeps us going is our refusal to care about what we do to either each other or people in other countries in our effort to improve our own selfish condition.
The only thing that will ensure that in 100years people are not speaking of us in the same nostalgic past-tense tones as they speak of the heyday of Rome is if we look around and say "I want everyone to be well so that as a country we are strong. Everyone irrespective of social status, buying power, or anything else."
We must abandon the idea that the Only Value of a Person is what they can either provide as a piece of machinery or what they can acquire by virtue of their status as walking ATMs.
Posted by: Kai at August 18, 2009 03:50 PM (iMRxM)
Hide Comments
| Add Comment
115kb generated in CPU 0.0602, elapsed 0.152 seconds.
63 queries taking 0.1296 seconds, 226 records returned.
Powered by Minx 1.1.6c-pink.