While the term Death Panel is a bit inaccurate and a politically charged term, the idea is that ObamaCare and other socialized medicine programs end up rationing care in such a manner to encourage people to die already in order to save money on treatment or extending lives.
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/6127514/Sentenced-to-death-on-the-NHS.html
Wednesday, September 2, 2009
Porkulus Stimuli
Just What America Needs [Jonah Goldberg]
From a reader:
Good morning Jonah. I opened my copy of the Wilmington News Journal this morning to find this front page story about a particular type of job that is being created by the stimulus, namely that of traffic flaggers at road construction sites. Who knew that they needed special training? I await the commercials for the training school that will be showing up any day now during McHale's Navy reruns. Not quite the high tech green industry jobs that Obama has been touting, eh?
A couple things. Last month when I was in Alaska, the road from Fairbanks to Chena had what seemed to be nearly a dozen construction crews spread out doing mostly nothing. There was a flagger at each one, who'd keep cars waiting for the unnecessary pilot car to guide us. Without the pilot car, we'd alll presumably smash into parked steamrollers or something. One of the flaggers, who appeared drunk, got it wrong both times we encountered him on our roundtrip. It's a sign with only two settings, "slow" and "stop" and he beat the 50-50 odds both times and got it wrong. He could have used training.
More seriously, I got the sense that the whole scene was classic Alaskan porkonomics. Most of the workers we saw were doing nothing at all, save of course getting paid while slowing economically productive traffic and transportation. Somewhere in there, I can't help but think there's a metaphor for Obamanomics.
From a reader:
Good morning Jonah. I opened my copy of the Wilmington News Journal this morning to find this front page story about a particular type of job that is being created by the stimulus, namely that of traffic flaggers at road construction sites. Who knew that they needed special training? I await the commercials for the training school that will be showing up any day now during McHale's Navy reruns. Not quite the high tech green industry jobs that Obama has been touting, eh?
A couple things. Last month when I was in Alaska, the road from Fairbanks to Chena had what seemed to be nearly a dozen construction crews spread out doing mostly nothing. There was a flagger at each one, who'd keep cars waiting for the unnecessary pilot car to guide us. Without the pilot car, we'd alll presumably smash into parked steamrollers or something. One of the flaggers, who appeared drunk, got it wrong both times we encountered him on our roundtrip. It's a sign with only two settings, "slow" and "stop" and he beat the 50-50 odds both times and got it wrong. He could have used training.
More seriously, I got the sense that the whole scene was classic Alaskan porkonomics. Most of the workers we saw were doing nothing at all, save of course getting paid while slowing economically productive traffic and transportation. Somewhere in there, I can't help but think there's a metaphor for Obamanomics.
Congress' "Approval" Rating in the Toilet
where it belongs:
'Congressional Favorability at a 24-Year Low' [NRO Staff]
From a new Pew Research Poll:
Americans are extremely displeased with Congress, and there are already some signs that this could take a toll on the Democrats in the 2010 midterm elections. Currently, 37% express a favorable opinion of Congress, while 52% hold an unfavorable view. Positive opinions of Congress have declined by 13 points since April and are now at one of their lowest points in more than two decades of Pew Research Center surveys.
At the same time, intentions to vote Democratic in the next midterm election are markedly lower than they have been over the past four years. Voters are about evenly divided when asked how they would vote if the election for Congress were being held today: 45% say they would vote for a Democratic candidate in their district, or lean Democratic, while 44% say they would vote for a Republican or lean Republican. At about this point four years ago, Democrats led in the generic congressional ballot by 52% to 40% and went on to win a majority of the popular vote and regain control of Congress the following November.
Krauthammer on how Obama's declining numbers impact local / state races:
On whether the New Jersey and Virginia governors' races point to a national GOP comeback:
Well, when you're way ahead and you think you are going to win, then you make it [off year elections] extremely important and national and predictive—which was always nonsense.
I think what is really interesting is how un-nationalized these races have become. And, as we heard, all of these issues are local—charges of corruption in New Jersey, actually, two-way charges, and [Bob McDonnell’s] thesis in Virginia. You can't get more local and personal than an attack on that basis.
At the beginning of the year when Obama was riding high, he had the wind at his back, of course he was incredibly popular, it looked as if they would be, again, national races in which Democrats had the advantage, again, running against Bush.
Here we are six months later. Obama has declined. The sheen is off. The magic is gone. And his numbers are at about 50 percent. What has happened is that Obama's decline has made these into local races again. The great trends, the Democratic sweep of last year is now over. It has been neutralized.
'Congressional Favorability at a 24-Year Low' [NRO Staff]
From a new Pew Research Poll:
Americans are extremely displeased with Congress, and there are already some signs that this could take a toll on the Democrats in the 2010 midterm elections. Currently, 37% express a favorable opinion of Congress, while 52% hold an unfavorable view. Positive opinions of Congress have declined by 13 points since April and are now at one of their lowest points in more than two decades of Pew Research Center surveys.
At the same time, intentions to vote Democratic in the next midterm election are markedly lower than they have been over the past four years. Voters are about evenly divided when asked how they would vote if the election for Congress were being held today: 45% say they would vote for a Democratic candidate in their district, or lean Democratic, while 44% say they would vote for a Republican or lean Republican. At about this point four years ago, Democrats led in the generic congressional ballot by 52% to 40% and went on to win a majority of the popular vote and regain control of Congress the following November.
Krauthammer on how Obama's declining numbers impact local / state races:
On whether the New Jersey and Virginia governors' races point to a national GOP comeback:
Well, when you're way ahead and you think you are going to win, then you make it [off year elections] extremely important and national and predictive—which was always nonsense.
I think what is really interesting is how un-nationalized these races have become. And, as we heard, all of these issues are local—charges of corruption in New Jersey, actually, two-way charges, and [Bob McDonnell’s] thesis in Virginia. You can't get more local and personal than an attack on that basis.
At the beginning of the year when Obama was riding high, he had the wind at his back, of course he was incredibly popular, it looked as if they would be, again, national races in which Democrats had the advantage, again, running against Bush.
Here we are six months later. Obama has declined. The sheen is off. The magic is gone. And his numbers are at about 50 percent. What has happened is that Obama's decline has made these into local races again. The great trends, the Democratic sweep of last year is now over. It has been neutralized.
Steny Hoyer: "I didn't say the bill would pay for itself, I said it would be paid for."
Steny Hoyer meets his constituents to try to sell ObamaCare. This is an informative and entertaining read.
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=OTg5YWQzMDJlYTQ4YjQwNTJlYjFmNTU3MWIzNjc2ZjY=
Almost all of these pols are tone-deaf weasels ....
Its amazing that normal people would wait on line to sit through hours of this crapola.
At least the SEIU folks are paid (and paid off to be there). Normal folks are gluttons for punishment (and many are simply pissed).
Steny Hoyer kills with these lines:
After he repeatedly assured everyone that this bill was fiscally responsible, another questioner asked somewhat incredulously how this bill would save money. Hoyer responded, "I didn't say the bill would pay for itself, I said it would be paid for." The angry crowd didn't like that bit of sophistry one bit.
And when another questioner asked how he could assure the bill's fiscal responsibility when Social Security and Medicare were bankrupt, Hoyer responded by saying, "Indeed, I don't know if they are going bankrupt . . ." and had to wait to continue because of the riotous laughter that ensued.
http://corner.nationalreview.com/post/?q=OTg5YWQzMDJlYTQ4YjQwNTJlYjFmNTU3MWIzNjc2ZjY=
Almost all of these pols are tone-deaf weasels ....
Its amazing that normal people would wait on line to sit through hours of this crapola.
At least the SEIU folks are paid (and paid off to be there). Normal folks are gluttons for punishment (and many are simply pissed).
Steny Hoyer kills with these lines:
After he repeatedly assured everyone that this bill was fiscally responsible, another questioner asked somewhat incredulously how this bill would save money. Hoyer responded, "I didn't say the bill would pay for itself, I said it would be paid for." The angry crowd didn't like that bit of sophistry one bit.
And when another questioner asked how he could assure the bill's fiscal responsibility when Social Security and Medicare were bankrupt, Hoyer responded by saying, "Indeed, I don't know if they are going bankrupt . . ." and had to wait to continue because of the riotous laughter that ensued.
Tuesday, September 1, 2009
Great Article by Victor Davis Hanson...
The Perpetual Whine: 'Bush Did It!' — Not Us [Victor Davis Hanson]
Robert Gibbs is once again trashing George Bush, nine months into the new presidency, for the growing violence in Afghanistan. Some observations on that:
1) Obama's crash in the polls has come with record speed, and is not just because all of his policies are both to the left of the voters and are at odds with a bait-and-switch veneer of moderation in the campaign. Just as important is this sense that Obama serially whines ("reset button," "Bush did it," etc.), and in his comments about doctors, insurance companies, Super Bowl attendees, Vegas visitors, the Special Olympics, the wealthy, the police, etc. shows a surprising meanness of spirit, at odds with the supposedly upbeat "no more red, no more blue state" campaign rhetoric. We know clearly that Americans do not like most of Obama's policies, but if they begin not to like Obama the man either, then he is in real Jimmy Carter-like trouble.
The American people sense now that a Hugo Chavez or a Saudi prince gets far more deference than do other Americans, and they are quite tired of it.
2) The Robert Gibbs lament that Bush "took his eye" off Afghanistan and now Obama is paying the price for neglect could well in part be true. The military has always wanted more men and money. But that is only part of the story. Consider casualties: Years after the removal of the Taliban, Afghanistan was still relatively quiet, and a year's fatalities there often were exceeded by a single month's deaths in Iraq (e.g. cf. 48 American dead in Afghanistan in 2003, 52 in 2004, 99 in 2005; 98 in 2006; etc. Yet more have been killed already in the first part of 2009 (183) than in all of last year combined (155). So why is Afghanistan heating up precisely as Iraq cooled off, and why the spike in violence when additional American money, manpower, and attention are now being directed to it?
No one really knows, but there may well be reasons other than either we are escalating, stirring up hornets, and offering more targets, or suffering the wages of George Bush's supposed past neglect (when 48 or 52 Americans were killed in an entire year).
All the talk of leaving Afghanistan, the constant trashing of the war on terror, the serial presidential proclamations to the Muslim world that America has been in the past culpable for a variety of sins and has underappreciated Muslim genius, the vows to investigate and even try members of the CIA, the overseas apology tour, etc. may well have emboldened a once dejected and battered Taliban and al-Qaeda into thinking that the U.S., not themselves, is tired, feels that it was wrong, and simply wants to call it quits and go home and accept the consequences of its "incorrect" thinking — sort of like the possible ripples to Dean Acheson's controversial January 1950 statement that South Korea was outside the sphere of U.S. security protection or April Glaspie's June 1990 assurances of U.S. uninterest in Iraqi-Kuwait border disputes.
Even more controversially, between 2003–2008 the United States military was eliminating thousands of al-Qaeda terrorists who flocked to Iraq, in a manner (given the open terrain, and lack of a mountainous refuge like a nuclear Pakistan), that was not possible then in Afghanistan. That topic has been a taboo subject the last six years, but the high losses that al-Qaeda-affiliated killers suffered in Iraq surely attenuated their ranks, and may have sent a message for some that to fight the U.S. military was to die.
We also do not like to think there are several theaters in roughly the same war, or that events in Iraq affected Afghanistan and vice versa, or that impressions and intentions sometimes are as important as facts on the ground, but history would suggest otherwise. In WWII how the U.S. fared in the distant Pacific affected to some degree what happened in Europe and vice versa (through perceptions, skills acquired, morale, and allotment of resources) despite the fact that Germany and Japan rarely knew what the other was doing.
Robert Gibbs is once again trashing George Bush, nine months into the new presidency, for the growing violence in Afghanistan. Some observations on that:
1) Obama's crash in the polls has come with record speed, and is not just because all of his policies are both to the left of the voters and are at odds with a bait-and-switch veneer of moderation in the campaign. Just as important is this sense that Obama serially whines ("reset button," "Bush did it," etc.), and in his comments about doctors, insurance companies, Super Bowl attendees, Vegas visitors, the Special Olympics, the wealthy, the police, etc. shows a surprising meanness of spirit, at odds with the supposedly upbeat "no more red, no more blue state" campaign rhetoric. We know clearly that Americans do not like most of Obama's policies, but if they begin not to like Obama the man either, then he is in real Jimmy Carter-like trouble.
The American people sense now that a Hugo Chavez or a Saudi prince gets far more deference than do other Americans, and they are quite tired of it.
2) The Robert Gibbs lament that Bush "took his eye" off Afghanistan and now Obama is paying the price for neglect could well in part be true. The military has always wanted more men and money. But that is only part of the story. Consider casualties: Years after the removal of the Taliban, Afghanistan was still relatively quiet, and a year's fatalities there often were exceeded by a single month's deaths in Iraq (e.g. cf. 48 American dead in Afghanistan in 2003, 52 in 2004, 99 in 2005; 98 in 2006; etc. Yet more have been killed already in the first part of 2009 (183) than in all of last year combined (155). So why is Afghanistan heating up precisely as Iraq cooled off, and why the spike in violence when additional American money, manpower, and attention are now being directed to it?
No one really knows, but there may well be reasons other than either we are escalating, stirring up hornets, and offering more targets, or suffering the wages of George Bush's supposed past neglect (when 48 or 52 Americans were killed in an entire year).
All the talk of leaving Afghanistan, the constant trashing of the war on terror, the serial presidential proclamations to the Muslim world that America has been in the past culpable for a variety of sins and has underappreciated Muslim genius, the vows to investigate and even try members of the CIA, the overseas apology tour, etc. may well have emboldened a once dejected and battered Taliban and al-Qaeda into thinking that the U.S., not themselves, is tired, feels that it was wrong, and simply wants to call it quits and go home and accept the consequences of its "incorrect" thinking — sort of like the possible ripples to Dean Acheson's controversial January 1950 statement that South Korea was outside the sphere of U.S. security protection or April Glaspie's June 1990 assurances of U.S. uninterest in Iraqi-Kuwait border disputes.
Even more controversially, between 2003–2008 the United States military was eliminating thousands of al-Qaeda terrorists who flocked to Iraq, in a manner (given the open terrain, and lack of a mountainous refuge like a nuclear Pakistan), that was not possible then in Afghanistan. That topic has been a taboo subject the last six years, but the high losses that al-Qaeda-affiliated killers suffered in Iraq surely attenuated their ranks, and may have sent a message for some that to fight the U.S. military was to die.
We also do not like to think there are several theaters in roughly the same war, or that events in Iraq affected Afghanistan and vice versa, or that impressions and intentions sometimes are as important as facts on the ground, but history would suggest otherwise. In WWII how the U.S. fared in the distant Pacific affected to some degree what happened in Europe and vice versa (through perceptions, skills acquired, morale, and allotment of resources) despite the fact that Germany and Japan rarely knew what the other was doing.
No Reckoning for ex. Gov. Bill Richardson
note to Bill ... send gift to Eric Holder ...
Two Views on the Dismissal of the Richardson Charges [Hans A. von Spakovsky]
Last Friday I had a post about the Justice Department’s dismissal of a public corruption case against New Mexico governor Bill Richardson. The AP reported that sources within Justice said the investigation had been killed in Washington. More evidence of that possibility comes from a letter sent by the U.S. Attorney in New Mexico, Gregory Fouratt, who is not an Obama political appointee, but a career lawyer appointed by the federal judges in his circuit to fill the vacancy in the U.S. Attorney’s office. The purpose of the letter was to notify Richardson and his political donor, a company called CDR, that the “United States will not seek to bring charges.”
But the letter goes on to say that CDR and its officers “made substantial contributions to Governor Richardson’s political organization during the time that the company sought financial work” with the state government and “pressure from the governor’s office resulted in the corruption of the procurement process so that CDR would be awarded such work.” The notification letter “is not to be interpreted as an exoneration of any party’s conduct.”
This is a very unusual letter, as anyone who has worked at the Justice Department can tell you. If one takes the innocent view, it could mean that Fouratt was telling the defendants that he knows they acted corruptly and illegally but they just got by with it because he does not have quite enough evidence to go to a jury with, but he is keeping his eye on them.
On the other hand, if you take a more cynical and jaundiced view, especially given the apparent political nature of many decisions in the Holder DOJ, the content of this letter supposedly clearing Richardson provides evidence that the AP story was correct and it was not the decision of the U.S. Attorney to dismiss this case. Fouratt came as close as he could to saying that in the letter without doing so directly.
You don’t have to do much reading between the lines to see that Fouratt may have been angry about being told by his political bosses in D.C. to dismiss an investigation that had revealed “corruption of the procurement process” by the governor’s office. But none of the media denizens of the press like the Washington Post or the New York Times are interested in this story from any standpoint other than reporting that Richardson, a political ally of President Obama, is now free and clear of a federal investigation because of claimed intervention by the president’s political appointees at Justice.
Side Bar: The ethical scorecard for 2008 Democratic Presidential Candidates
Richardson: possible criminal
Edwards: liar; baby daddy; sleazebag; adulterer; possible criminal
Dodd: friend of Angelo, FNM, FRE, Ireland homes; possible criminal
Hillary: well, where to start ?
Kucinich: Kook - and maybe the most ethical of the bunch
Sharpton: Kook; race baiter; shakedown artist; possible criminal
Obama .... well, y'know Ayers, Rev Wright, ACORN, SEIU, Rezko, well, y'know. and POTUS.
Two Views on the Dismissal of the Richardson Charges [Hans A. von Spakovsky]
Last Friday I had a post about the Justice Department’s dismissal of a public corruption case against New Mexico governor Bill Richardson. The AP reported that sources within Justice said the investigation had been killed in Washington. More evidence of that possibility comes from a letter sent by the U.S. Attorney in New Mexico, Gregory Fouratt, who is not an Obama political appointee, but a career lawyer appointed by the federal judges in his circuit to fill the vacancy in the U.S. Attorney’s office. The purpose of the letter was to notify Richardson and his political donor, a company called CDR, that the “United States will not seek to bring charges.”
But the letter goes on to say that CDR and its officers “made substantial contributions to Governor Richardson’s political organization during the time that the company sought financial work” with the state government and “pressure from the governor’s office resulted in the corruption of the procurement process so that CDR would be awarded such work.” The notification letter “is not to be interpreted as an exoneration of any party’s conduct.”
This is a very unusual letter, as anyone who has worked at the Justice Department can tell you. If one takes the innocent view, it could mean that Fouratt was telling the defendants that he knows they acted corruptly and illegally but they just got by with it because he does not have quite enough evidence to go to a jury with, but he is keeping his eye on them.
On the other hand, if you take a more cynical and jaundiced view, especially given the apparent political nature of many decisions in the Holder DOJ, the content of this letter supposedly clearing Richardson provides evidence that the AP story was correct and it was not the decision of the U.S. Attorney to dismiss this case. Fouratt came as close as he could to saying that in the letter without doing so directly.
You don’t have to do much reading between the lines to see that Fouratt may have been angry about being told by his political bosses in D.C. to dismiss an investigation that had revealed “corruption of the procurement process” by the governor’s office. But none of the media denizens of the press like the Washington Post or the New York Times are interested in this story from any standpoint other than reporting that Richardson, a political ally of President Obama, is now free and clear of a federal investigation because of claimed intervention by the president’s political appointees at Justice.
Side Bar: The ethical scorecard for 2008 Democratic Presidential Candidates
Richardson: possible criminal
Edwards: liar; baby daddy; sleazebag; adulterer; possible criminal
Dodd: friend of Angelo, FNM, FRE, Ireland homes; possible criminal
Hillary: well, where to start ?
Kucinich: Kook - and maybe the most ethical of the bunch
Sharpton: Kook; race baiter; shakedown artist; possible criminal
Obama .... well, y'know Ayers, Rev Wright, ACORN, SEIU, Rezko, well, y'know. and POTUS.
Sunday, August 30, 2009
Psssst, Don't Tell Anyone But the CIA's Enhanced Interrogation Techniques Worked [Andy McCarthy]
I really like this piece by Andrew McCarthy:
Psssst, Don't Tell Anyone But the CIA's Enhanced Interrogation Techniques Worked [Andy McCarthy]
On a Saturday morning in late August, while country was away on summer vacation and those who closely watch politics were watching Ted Kennedy's funeral, the Washington Post quietly hung up the mainstream media's white flag on the CIA's harsh interrogation tactics. It turns out, they work — who knew?
Fortunately, Steve Hayes has stayed on the case and, at the Standard's blog, he's got the story about the story — along with excerpts from the essential report by FDD's Tom Joscelyn (also in the Standard, here) relating the effectiveness of the CIA program and an important op-ed by FDD's Reuel Marc Gerecht (in the Wall Street Journal, here) about the devastating consequences of the Obama administration's decision to investigate the CIA over interrogation practices. My own assessments of the legal meritlessness of the case against the interrogators and the reasons why it is being persued anyway by President Obama and Attorney General Holder are here and here.
As they say, you're entitled to your own opinion, but not to your own facts. The MSM has tried to have both for the last five years, arguing against experience and common sense that tactics like sleep-deprivation and waterboarding were not effective. Clearly, they worked, and to great effect. As Steve says, that case should now be closed.
Obviously, there is still a principled argument to be made that the nation should not engage in such practices. But the burden of making it in a principled way should be to say: "While this is an excruciating choice, it would be better for thousands of Americans to be killed than to allow the CIA to use non-lethal coercive tactics (that cause no lasting physical or mental damage) on a terrorist who refuses to tell us what he knows about ongoing mass-murder plots."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/28/AR2009082803874_2.html
Holder's Anti-CIA Witch Hunt [Andy McCarthy]
Also not to be missed this weekend is Jennifer Rubin's excellent article about AG Holder's decision to investigate the CIA, just out in the new edition of the Weekly Standard. A few weeks back, Jen did a great in-depth analysis of how pervasively politicized the Justice Department has become under Holder. Now she scopes out the most politicized decision of all ... at least to date.
Psssst, Don't Tell Anyone But the CIA's Enhanced Interrogation Techniques Worked [Andy McCarthy]
On a Saturday morning in late August, while country was away on summer vacation and those who closely watch politics were watching Ted Kennedy's funeral, the Washington Post quietly hung up the mainstream media's white flag on the CIA's harsh interrogation tactics. It turns out, they work — who knew?
Fortunately, Steve Hayes has stayed on the case and, at the Standard's blog, he's got the story about the story — along with excerpts from the essential report by FDD's Tom Joscelyn (also in the Standard, here) relating the effectiveness of the CIA program and an important op-ed by FDD's Reuel Marc Gerecht (in the Wall Street Journal, here) about the devastating consequences of the Obama administration's decision to investigate the CIA over interrogation practices. My own assessments of the legal meritlessness of the case against the interrogators and the reasons why it is being persued anyway by President Obama and Attorney General Holder are here and here.
As they say, you're entitled to your own opinion, but not to your own facts. The MSM has tried to have both for the last five years, arguing against experience and common sense that tactics like sleep-deprivation and waterboarding were not effective. Clearly, they worked, and to great effect. As Steve says, that case should now be closed.
Obviously, there is still a principled argument to be made that the nation should not engage in such practices. But the burden of making it in a principled way should be to say: "While this is an excruciating choice, it would be better for thousands of Americans to be killed than to allow the CIA to use non-lethal coercive tactics (that cause no lasting physical or mental damage) on a terrorist who refuses to tell us what he knows about ongoing mass-murder plots."
http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2009/08/28/AR2009082803874_2.html
Holder's Anti-CIA Witch Hunt [Andy McCarthy]
Also not to be missed this weekend is Jennifer Rubin's excellent article about AG Holder's decision to investigate the CIA, just out in the new edition of the Weekly Standard. A few weeks back, Jen did a great in-depth analysis of how pervasively politicized the Justice Department has become under Holder. Now she scopes out the most politicized decision of all ... at least to date.
Ted Kennedy passes ... not all media is obsequious ...
A couple of worthwhile reads here: (caution, not favorable to Teddy ...)
http://www.nypost.com/seven/08292009/postopinion/opedcolumnists/the_kennedy_myth_187072.htm?&page=1
http://www.forbes.com/2009/08/27/ted-kennedy-soviet-union-ronald-reagan-opinions-columnists-peter-robinson.html?feed=rss_popstories
I find it a bit galling, and of course completely politically cynical, the talk that MA should change their law to allow for a quick replacement to be named. First of all, Kennedy could have resigned, instead of being an absentee gravely ill Senator, but he didn't. So clearly he could have cared less about this sucession problem (until the last few days of his life, anyway). Second, MA already cynically changed the law when Kerry ran for President so Mitt Romney, then MA governor couldn't appoint a replacement Senator if Kerry won, which was a change in the law that Ted Kennedy supported and advocated for at the time.
Typical of the Democratic Party, they seem to always try to pull a fast one when they don't like the law or it doesn't suit their political interests of the moment. I find this repellent.
Anyway, while I did not have a particularly favorable opinion regarding the late Sen. Kennedy, nor do I quite get the media's (and to a lesser extent, the public's) continued fascination w/ the Kennedy family, I still do say, RIP Senator.
http://www.nypost.com/seven/08292009/postopinion/opedcolumnists/the_kennedy_myth_187072.htm?&page=1
http://www.forbes.com/2009/08/27/ted-kennedy-soviet-union-ronald-reagan-opinions-columnists-peter-robinson.html?feed=rss_popstories
I find it a bit galling, and of course completely politically cynical, the talk that MA should change their law to allow for a quick replacement to be named. First of all, Kennedy could have resigned, instead of being an absentee gravely ill Senator, but he didn't. So clearly he could have cared less about this sucession problem (until the last few days of his life, anyway). Second, MA already cynically changed the law when Kerry ran for President so Mitt Romney, then MA governor couldn't appoint a replacement Senator if Kerry won, which was a change in the law that Ted Kennedy supported and advocated for at the time.
Typical of the Democratic Party, they seem to always try to pull a fast one when they don't like the law or it doesn't suit their political interests of the moment. I find this repellent.
Anyway, while I did not have a particularly favorable opinion regarding the late Sen. Kennedy, nor do I quite get the media's (and to a lesser extent, the public's) continued fascination w/ the Kennedy family, I still do say, RIP Senator.
Shame on the British re: Lockerbie bombing; Libya
This was truly a despicable move (something you expect from Europeans and the type of thing you could see the Obama admin doing as well - maybe not re: Lockerbie, but re: Iraq or Israel or Taiwan or something).
The price of justice [Mark Steyn]
Well, now we know what Her Majesty's Government considers the lives of 279 terrorism victims to be worth:
The British government decided it was “in the overwhelming interests of the United Kingdom” to make Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, the Lockerbie bomber, eligible for return to Libya, leaked ministerial letters reveal.
Gordon Brown’s government made the decision after discussions between Libya and BP over a multi-million-pound oil exploration deal had hit difficulties. These were resolved soon afterwards.
The letters were sent two years ago by Jack Straw, the justice secretary, to Kenny MacAskill, his counterpart in Scotland, who has been widely criticised for taking the formal decision to permit Megrahi’s release.
The correspondence makes it plain that the key decision to include Megrahi in a deal with Libya to allow prisoners to return home was, in fact, taken in London for British national interests.
Inevitably, the Labour Party's spinmeisters spent the days since the mass murderer's release promoting the idea that the government in London is furious with what's happened but that it was entirely the responsibility of the Scottish Justice Minister and his colleagues. And as usual the oleaginous creep Peter Mandelson, insisting that Westminster had no influence on a Scottish Nationalist (ie, secessionist) government, couldn't help protesting too much:
Lord Mandelson, the business secretary, said last weekend: “The idea that the British government and the Libyan government would sit down and somehow barter over the freedom or the life of this Libyan prisoner and make it form part of some business deal ... it’s not only wrong, it’s completely implausible and actually quite offensive.”
I'm sure. Fortunately, Lord Mandelson's well-connected friends will do his best to help him get over that,
The price of justice [Mark Steyn]
Well, now we know what Her Majesty's Government considers the lives of 279 terrorism victims to be worth:
The British government decided it was “in the overwhelming interests of the United Kingdom” to make Abdelbaset Ali Mohmed al-Megrahi, the Lockerbie bomber, eligible for return to Libya, leaked ministerial letters reveal.
Gordon Brown’s government made the decision after discussions between Libya and BP over a multi-million-pound oil exploration deal had hit difficulties. These were resolved soon afterwards.
The letters were sent two years ago by Jack Straw, the justice secretary, to Kenny MacAskill, his counterpart in Scotland, who has been widely criticised for taking the formal decision to permit Megrahi’s release.
The correspondence makes it plain that the key decision to include Megrahi in a deal with Libya to allow prisoners to return home was, in fact, taken in London for British national interests.
Inevitably, the Labour Party's spinmeisters spent the days since the mass murderer's release promoting the idea that the government in London is furious with what's happened but that it was entirely the responsibility of the Scottish Justice Minister and his colleagues. And as usual the oleaginous creep Peter Mandelson, insisting that Westminster had no influence on a Scottish Nationalist (ie, secessionist) government, couldn't help protesting too much:
Lord Mandelson, the business secretary, said last weekend: “The idea that the British government and the Libyan government would sit down and somehow barter over the freedom or the life of this Libyan prisoner and make it form part of some business deal ... it’s not only wrong, it’s completely implausible and actually quite offensive.”
I'm sure. Fortunately, Lord Mandelson's well-connected friends will do his best to help him get over that,
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