Candidate versus President; When high hopes meet reality

Found this video on Flopping Aces, and I seriously suggest the non-believers out there give it a look. You have to wonder what kind of uneducated mass of voters actually believed this man would solve anything, let alone pay their taxes (yes, I am looking at you Peggy Joseph). The problem is every time you give this man an inch, he takes a mile, and then blames you for it. Take a look at the AIG situation if you need some further convincing. The Democrats, most notably Chris Dodd, Timothy Geithner and the President himself, allowed the bonuses to be written into a bill which they all voted in favour of, and now they are the ones fanning the flames of outrage. Even if you actually believed what was being said on the campaign trail, how could you continue to support him now? There were promises of transparency, promises of spending wisely, promises of clearing the national debt, where are those promises now? That isn’t what “Candidate” Obama said would be happening when he took office…

Where is this transparency when we hear about this clause in the bank bailout bill? They make a fuss over it, discuss how this is all “Wall Street Greed”, and then almost condone “lynch mob” violence directed at AIG employees who received bonuses. You even have CNN’s Anderson Cooper doing the administration’s “dirty work” by naming these bonus recipients in his new segment “Lifestyles of the Rich and Shameless”. Death threats are being thrown around, and he is telling these same misguided people where to find these “villains”. If one of these AID employees is harmed by these “lynch mobs” after being identified by Cooper (not to mention Democrats like Barney Frank), he could be found criminally responsible, doesn’t he understand that? This lunacy could have been prevented through transparency, HELL, even honesty at the part of Obama and his ilk, but this isn’t how the new administration operates.

How about these promises of spending wisely? What about clearing the national debt? Being accountable for every penny? You still hear this from House and Senate Democrats, even when TRILLIONS are being wasted. Ed Henry questioned Obama about this spending, and he didn’t get an answer (the first question asked on the video Michelle Malkin has up). We keep hearing about how they are fighting the debt, but you don’t spend your way out of the “red” to get into the “black”. Another video from Flopping Aces, a look into a future America will experience if it continues following Britain down the path to financial oblivion…

If you continue strangling the economy, you prevent growth, and by preventing growth, you turn a recession into a depression. As I have stated numerous times before, the key to economic success is maintaining competition in a mostly free market system. What we are seeing from Obama isn’t that. Every time Geithner speaks lately, something horrible happens. Whether it is the dollar or the markets, it is obvious that investors, both foreign and domestic, don’t have confidence in the administration to fix the economy. I definitely didn’t when I saw the Steve Kroft interview on 60 Minutes, seeing Obama laugh off the economic situation millions of Americans are struggling with now. That wasn’t what we saw on the campaign trail…

“Candidate” Obama said one thing, President Obama is doing another. If you ever needed proof of the hypocrisy of a politician, especially the one who is President now, compare Youtube videos of his speeches to what he is saying to the Press now. It is absolutely shocking when his supporters’ high hopes are shattered by the reality of what is going on… And it isn’t even the end of the first year of his term…

UPDATE: Ed Morrissey is discussing the question raised by Ed Henry during last night’s press conference. With all this spending, it comes as no surprise that people are predicting a massive increase in the national debt, something even members of the Press are starting to see. Many of them are beginning to notice significant difference between Obama’s campaign promises and his actions. Let’s hope this trend continues…

On another note, Allahpundit discusses the “MEP member trashing Gordon Brown” video I have posted above. While I will say that America isn’t there yet, if Obama continues bringing out these new spending plans, it won’t be long before the United States is in just as much trouble as Britain. You hear that Scott Gunsaullus? Spending more money THERE has brought them more trouble then its worth…

Then again, you don’t have any real economic knowledge, so you wouldn’t know spending a country into oblivion isn’t a good thing… Pathetic…

Red Eye and the Canadian Military; Calm down, it wasn’t that bad

My father always tells me to consider the source when someone says something offensive. It helps to understand this point, that while what is being said might be offensive to some, those who are saying it might not mean it to be meant that way. Greg Gutfeld surely didn’t mean for anything in this segment to be taken as a slap against the Canadian military, but let’s not forget that Red Eye has never tried to be a serious show, it has never tried to be a “respectable pillar of journalism”, it is a late night comedy show.

As Hot Air’s Allahpundit said, these offensive remarks didn’t come from Greg Gutfeld himself, but from guest Doug Benson, who’s ignorance started this uproar. Benson is a comedian who is obviously not a an expert in international relations, nor well versed on the NATO mission in Afghanistan, so let’s once again consider the source. Bill Schulz’s comments about the Royal Canadian Mounted Police did offend me, but that is what he does on Red Eye. I honestly find him the least funniest member on the show, and taking swipes at an organization he doesn’t really know about or even understand is pretty much “par for the course” for Schulz. Even in this atmosphere of “Canada bashing”, there was something we could take out of it…

This entire segment was a “gut reaction” to Lieutenant-General Andrew Leslie’s statement about the possibility of Canadian forces stepping away the War on Terror for at least a year following their withdrawal in 2011. After Gordon Brown’s call for withdrawal of troops from Iraq, it is understandable that many Americans would be upset at what appears to be a drop in international support. Jonathan Hoenig does make the point that even with this, American’s should realize that it isn’t Canada’s fault that events are turning out they way there are in Afghanistan. For a country which has refused to name the enemy we are fighting (now even refusing to use the word “terrorism”), as Hoenig explained, America hasn’t done enough to support NATO forces in Afghanistan, especially the ones with Canadian flag patches on their shoulders. That was actually a compliment for those keeping score…

Instead of being outraged, maybe we should have spent time analyzing what was really being said, what the context of the conversation was, not simply take a few words out of context and lose our minds. With that said, I can see where these people are coming from. All this comes on a day where Canada was in mourning for four fallen soldiers returning from Afghanistan to be laid to rest. I also don’t question that Defence Minister Peter MacKay was sincere in his outrage over these ill-advised comments, especially since he has been to Afghanistan and met with Canadian soldiers. His call for an apology wasn’t along the lines of the Democrat’s faux-outrage over AIG, it wasn’t politically motivated, nor was their any other sinister reason for targeting Red Eye’s host like he did. Let’s be careful of what we say about him and others who have expressed their disgust at what they saw as deeply offensive (I am already taken back by some of Canadian bloggers who have openly attacked those critical of Benson’s comments). One’s freedom of speech doesn’t mean everyone has to accept what is being said…

In closing, I think we as Canadians should take a step back and examine this whole situation. We have long joked about Canada’s military, hearing about submarines that sunk and helicopters that couldn’t fly, so why are we offended when Americans begin doing the same thing? No one is questioning the dedication of our men and women in uniform, but for too long we haven’t provided the funding necessary to maintain a functioning military. In a country where the NDP has gained more political power in the last few years, a party which obviously doesn’t understand the threat posed by those like British MP George Galloway, it comes as no surprise that our once respect military is now the butt of jokes on both sides of the border. If we want to be taken seriously, we should do our best to support those who are willing to make the “ultimate sacrifice” by electing officials who believe in the use of force when diplomacy fails, as well as push for more funding for our struggling armed forces…

We were the country which took Vimy Ridge, we are the ones who held off the invasion of 1812, let’s not forget that… And if we do, then we deserve for more than Red Eye’s ill-advised jokes…

Enough with AIG; Obama’s Puppet Show and Democratic faux-Outrage

You really have to wonder whether or not these politicians are as dumb as they think we are. Ran across this video on Hot Air, and since Michelle Malkin was giving her take on this whole fiasco, I thought it was something my readers should see…

I have to say I have a hard time cranking out posts like I used to. If I was to put out a new post everyday like I had done during the election, I would not only run out of topics, I would also burn myself out. It is disturbing that this downright corruption goes on with Western media unwilling to to report on it. President Barack Obama pulls their strings and his puppets dance, they bend to his will and push his propaganda through their once respected news agencies. What makes this whole situation entertaining is that two of these loyal servants, Dana Bash and Wolf Blitzer of CNN, made the mistake of “connecting the dots” and following this fiasco back to its source, Democrat Chris Dodd. Whether this was a misstep or an act of actual journalism, it is out there now, Democrats are wrapped up in this scandal and all we are seeing now is, as Michelle Malkin stated, “a well-crafted Kabuki Theatre”.

It all started with Chris Dodd’s protection of AIG bonuses, that it was his call to include specific language in the bailout bill which would protect these bonuses which were required to be paid out as per the employee contracts. He realized that the company had a legal obligation to its workers, and while it would (and has) generated outrage, it was important to go through with this or risk losing productive workers. YES I SAID IT, PRODUCTIVE! It was the housing market collapse that triggered all this, years of incompetence at Fannie-Mae and Freddie-Mac, pumping “financial poison” through the system had much more to do with this situation then the day-to-day practices of AIG (American International Group) or any other financial institution in the United States. Remember that it was the Democrats who were defending the actions of Franklin Raines and his ilk, people who forced through all these sub-prime loans which caused this meltdown following the housing market collapse, these same Democrats who now want to confiscate these bonuses from AIG workers. Tell you what Barney Frank, AIG employees gets to hold onto their bonuses until you give back your ill-gotten wealth. This is hypocrisy on steroids, who do these people think they are demanding hard-working Americans simply give them money? Outrageous…

We don’t know how many people have gotten this money, it could be that there are thousands of AIG employees worldwide which were promised this money, that the individual payment to each person was only a small amount, but no one seems to want to consider this. Even with death threats against AIG employees, these Democrats want to continue this fiasco, not really investigate what is actually going on. Why not continue “connecting the dots”? If they aren’t willing to find out what the facts are, let’s see who else is wrapped up in this mess. From Dodd, we go to Timothy Geithner, Obama’s Treasury Secretary. According to Massimo Calabresi at Time Online, Geithner knew about these bonuses well before he would admit to…

Although Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner told congressional leaders on Tuesday that he learned of AIG’s impending $160 million bonus payments to members of its troubled financial-products unit on March 10, sources tell TIME that the New York Federal Reserve informed Treasury staff that the payments were imminent on Feb. 28. That is 10 days before Treasury staffers say they first learned “full details” of the bonus plan, and three days before the Administration launched a new $30 billion infusion of cash for AIG…

…The Treasury Department official says the fault appears to lie with career staffers at the department who failed to report the imminent bonus deadline up the chain to Geithner. This failure may be a by-product of the difficulty Geithner has had staffing up at Treasury. But he still has personal vulnerability on the issue. It was Geithner, as head of the New York Federal Reserve, who negotiated the AIG bailout last September. At that time, he could have sought to get bonuses repealed as part of the massive government loan.

An article from Allahpundit at Hot Air lead me to this story. With this information we can see that this scandal goes much farther then a disgraceful Democratic Senator, but this leads farther up the chain then the Treasury Secretary. Would it surprise anyone that Barack Obama himself is wrapped up in all this? Remember that this is the man who signed the bailout bill, the man who rushed through this multi-billion dollar “helping hand” for AIG was “BMWing” about former President Bush “rushing” the Patriot Act in 2004. He either didn’t read it or he did and didn’t care, but either way, Obama is another politician responsible for this mess. AIG isn’t the “suicide bomber” here, this man and his administration are the one’s with “their finger on the trigger”, threatening to seize American assets if they don’t get their way. Talk about a “Trojan Horse”, Obama and his ilk were elected because they promised this kind of thing wouldn’t happen, that it wouldn’t be “business as usual”, but all we are seeing is stereotypical politician behaviour. Once again, would it surprise any of you that both Barack Obama and Chris Dodd received sizable campaign contributions from AIG? Unbelievable…

*****

This whole fiasco is political opportunism. It isn’t surprising that the Democrats need to create an outrage with the way they have been mishandling the reigns of power since Obama took office, just look at this man’s “brilliant” idea in having wounded veterans pay for their own medical bills. The same goes with the John Stewart/Jim Cramer sham, the administration and its supporters are simply lashing out to redirect the public’s attention on anything BUT their own incompetence. I don’t need Tucker Carlson telling me that it didn’t make sense, I knew that when Stewart starting using older clips out of context to as “evidence” of CNBC’s “evil ways”. That whole debacle was used to distract the ill-informed, to discredit the financial critics, to keep them from realizing that Cramer was right, that Obama and his ilk are on a path of “wealth destruction”. This week it is AIG getting hammers, next week it will be another irrelevant target, and Democrats will fake their outrage yet again. It is predictable to the point that it is laughable…

It is almost funny enough to make one forget that this is a twisted and sinister “puppet show”… And I for one won’t let that man, nor any of his supporters, pull my strings…

UPDATE: And the fiasco continues. Hot Air has a post up on the vote to strip AIG employees of their bonuses. this is disturbing, since when does any politician have the right to simply take money from anyone they choose? They hire criminals to “assist” with the census, they continue to put BILLIONS into a failing school system, put even more BILLIONS into the pockets of tax-cheats, etc and this is what they do? Attack those in the private sector? I am not surprised that investors aren’t putting their money into the American economy, no one wants to risk losing anything on a system which is being strangled by the most corrupt administration I have ever seen….

This is how to extend a recession… And yet the “puppets still dance”, ignoring what is going on…

UPDATE: And the finger pointing begins, as Hot Air’s Allahpundit reports.

Variations on a theme of Democratic disarray: Madam Speaker’s miffed at Dodd for exempting the bonuses in the first place, the nutroots are miffed at Emanuel and Axelrod for dismissing the intensity of America’s outrageously outrageous outrage, and Treasury’s miffed at the Federal Reserve for not giving it any lead time to dodge a political freight train…

…The downside to this goldmine? The GOP’s obliged, as a simple matter of smart politics, to pile on and demagogue the bonuses too, even though the public’s anger is not only potentially dangerous but might end up being harnessed by the left for counterproductive, wealth-destroying means. It’s a question, I guess, of which side can more effectively exploit their version of the “lesson” here: For Republicans, it’s proof of the folly of bailouts and for Democrats it’s proof that business needs to be more tightly regulated. If ever we needed the party to be on its game message-wise, it’s now.

Gone are the days when someone was willing to take the blame to get the situation resolved… I would trade this twisted “puppet show” for four more years of President George W. Bush in a heartbeat…

UPDATE: The instant I heard about the DVD gift, I KNEW that this would happen. I myself went through the trials and tribulations of regional formatting, and unless you can hack the DVD player (or buy one from a country like China where regional locks aren’t strictly enforced) you will find yourself with this headache. The Telegraph has more…

Alas, when the PM settled down to begin watching them the other night, he found there was a problem.

The films only worked in DVD players made in North America and the words “wrong region” came up on his screen. Although he mournfully had to put the popcorn away, he is unlikely to jeopardise the special relationship – or “special partnership”, as we are now supposed to call it – by registering a complaint.

A Downing Street spokesman said he was “confident” that any gift Obama gave Brown would have been “well thought through,” but referred me to the White House for assistance on the “technical aspects”.

A White House spokesman sniggered when I put the story to him and he was still looking into the matter when my deadline came last night.

By the way, when Obama’s unlikely gift was disclosed, a reader emailed me to ask if Clueless was among the films. Funnily enough, it was not.

Brown, on the other hand, presented a rather more thoughtful gift to the American President in the form of a penholder carved from the timbers of an anti-slavery ship. The sister ship, in fact, of the one that was broken up and turned into the desk in the Oval Office.

I thought this “puppet master” was supposed to help us revive our foreign relations? With the AIG distraction in full swing, as well as the continue bailout bullshit, very few people are going to hear about this debacle… Hilarious…

UPDATE: Barack Obama must be praying that CNN and others in the MSM spends more time “investigating” AIG bonuses because it looks like he stepped in it again. According to Ed Morrissey at Hot Air, as well as Michelle Malkin, during his sit down with Jay Leno, “The One” compared his low bowling scores to the Special Olympics. WOW! So it isn’t simply American Veterans, but the disabled who are targets of Obama’s snobbery. Do we really want four more years of this? He better start acting with a little more class than this, especially if he doesn’t want his presidency to end in 2012…

Stay classy Mr President… Pathetic…

Steven Crowder is at it again; Human Rights, Us and Them

I have to say this guy has talent. Bumped into his newest video on Hot Air, and it is just as enjoyable as the last one. One has to wonder how long he can keep putting these videos up without have someone come after him, whether it be YouTube or some Muslim organization complaining about “hate speech”. In any event, it is nice to know there are those out there who are willing to make themselves and their beliefs known, even if they aren’t politically correct.

If there is anything I could add to what has been said so far, it would be a quote from Frank Miller, a man who I deeply respect, not just for his work in the field of fictional writing (comic books to be precise)…

Nobody questions why we, after Pearl Harbor, attacked Nazi Germany. It was because we were taking on a form of global fascism, we’re doing the same thing now … It seems to me quite obvious that our country and the entire Western World is up against an existential foe that knows exactly what it wants…. For some reason, nobody seems to be talking about who we’re up against, and the sixth-century barbarism that they actually represent. These people saw people’s heads off. They enslave women, they genitally mutilate their daughters, they do not behave by any cultural norms that are sensible to us. I’m speaking into a microphone that never could have been a product of their culture, and I’m living in a city where 3000 of my neighbors were killed by thieves of airplanes they never could have built.

If it isn’t their prisoners/hostages, it is their women. Michelle Malkin is reporting on the situation developing with Muzzammil Hassan, the man who beheaded his wife. He plead not guilty to the murder already, something which is bound to spark an “interest” in his trial, if not generate some sort of perverted sympathy for this monster. I hope it isn’t simply me who is outright disgusted with the way things have been going lately. I could go on and on about how so many of these former detainees are back trying to kill us, but I think more then enough has been said by so many others…

If it isn’t people complaining about prisoner treatment, it is the push that we accept other “cultures” as they are. Enough is enough… Either they start acting like adults, or we deny them a seat at the “big table”…

In Defense of Commies; China, Western Criticisim and Me

I have to say I am getting sick of all these people taking shots at the Chinese. It isn’t simply the “loony left”, the people who wish to be like China and other Socialist countries in every way possible (hypocrites who are jealous of Soviet “success”), but many people on the right of the spectrum as well. Take Ed Morrissey’s article about a Chinese protester yesterday. Now I like Morrissey’s work, and anyone who has spent time on my blog knows I like to it a lot, but I can’t sit by and let much of these ignorant statements go, not when they continue to villainize an entire country because of the actions of a few government officials.

Every time we hear about the “Chinese Government”, an entity which has almost become as hated as “The Man”, we think of an all powerful, tyrannical ruler which has enslaved and impoverished its people to fulfill its dark desires. Many people, especially on the left (looking at you Jack Layton, Leader of the NDP) like to lump the “Chinese Government” in with the “Chinese People”, and simply villainize the entire population of the country. It would be foolish for me to say that there isn’t any factual basis for much of these beliefs, but I do believe that this is an extreme characterization of the Chinese Communist Party and the people of China. Let’s not forget much of the information that does make it to the nightly news, the “truth” which is spoke which is spoke of about China comes from dubious sources at best.

That’s right, you heard me, DUBIOUS. This isn’t the first article Ed Morrissey has put out on the “evil and tyrannical” Chinese, last August he came out and quoted a report from The Guardian, a paper which many have noted for its sometimes extreme left-wing bias, about the mistreatment of reporters who were covering the “peaceful” Free Tibet Protests…

John Ray, a correspondent for ITN, says he was “bundled away, pushed to the floor and pinned down” before being “manhandled into the back of a police van.” …

“They are claiming I tried to unfurl a Tibet banner. I did not at any time try to unfurl a banner and I have never possessed any banner or protest material. I was there simply to report on a demonstration, not to take part in it in any way,” he tells The Guardian.

Haven’t we seen this kind of one-sided reporting on this side of the Pacific? What about the arrest of Amy Goodwin at last year’s Republican Convention? Even Ed Morrissey himself reported on this story, discussing the other side which Goodwin’s supporters left out. The problem is, as we saw with this incident, that when you do get one side of the story, the “victim” has full authority on the “truth” of the incident. From a left-wing source, as The Guardian has shown itself to be, we see the usual villainization of a group of people who’s voice isn’t being reported, whether that is purposeful or simply because of the variety of communication issues which exist between the Chinese authorities and the Western media. On that note, while these protests in Beijing were relatively peaceful, those in Tibet definitely weren’t…

We all remember the reporting of the riots in Tibet last year, reporting which got CNN Jack Cafferty in trouble with his remarks, which were as usual ignorant and ill-advised. We remember that many people looked to the Dhalai Lama for the “truth” on what was going on, quoting his spokesmen who were saying that Chinese authorities’ response to the Tibetan rioters was “baseless”. I can tell you from what I know about the Chinese government and how it deals with protests, both big and small, that the military presence in Tibet was there long before the protests, something which a friend of mine, “Mrs Robinson”, can even testify too. Her visit to the region had surprised her since she wasn’t aware that the Chinese had already began watching the area, even using tanks to maintain an uneasy peace. The violence started as the Olympics got closer, with the Dhalai Lama’s supporters looking to make a political statement, if not fulfill some “perverted desire” to become martyrs for the cause.

Yes you heard me right, MARTYRS. It isn’t simply Islam which celebrates those who have “died for the cause”, it also seems that the Dhalai Lama and his supporters have made similar efforts for their cause. As discussed on TibetBlogs, the aim of this protest, to many it would seem, was simply to become “martyrs for the cause”. Whether it be laying under tanks, running into gun fire, etc many of these people were looking to die in service of the movement. Does the Dhalai Lama denounce this? Not at all, he uses it to further his cause. He is among the most dangerous people in this whole fiasco, a religious and political leader with absolute moral authority, that WE have bestowed upon him with our proclamations of his “purity”, a man who’s followers are more than happy to sacrifice their lives for his cause. How is it that we can still take him seriously, especially after his most recent display of twisted mentality (like I’m going to take sexual advice for a man who has forsaken it)?

Once you realize that the “credible source” most news agencies use is this man and his followers, you really have to question what is being said. You can criticize me for being “biased” in favour of the Chinese people, but I really think much of what I have said here is because I have seen both sides of the issue, not simply swallowed a narrow view of a complex situation. If it isn’t Tibet, it is China itself. The situation in that country is very hard to understand if you haven’t lived it yourself. Over-population in urban areas, a mostly uneducated country which depends even the lowest forms of employment to pay the bills, etc. The country as a whole is decades behind the West and it is unrealistic to simply judge the actions of the people and their government by our standards, whether that is the standards of living, the standards of education, or the standards of human rights.

I can tell you from my own experience that the Chinese government doesn’t exist as a united body with total control of all political decisions in the country. You have numerous different agencies, different governing bodies within China’s many provinces, each answering to a variety of different Communist Party officials, each with their own agenda, whether they are looking to do their best for the country or the best for themselves. Even within the Communist Party you have the believers and non-believers, those who believe in Chairman Mao’s dream and those who realize their luxury depends on maintaining a failing system. Even though it is a failing system, the fact that they have adopted many principles found in Western capitalism to strengthen their economy, as well as granting Tibet and other region in China limited autonomy through negotiations, which does include their recent talks with the Dhalai Lama, shows that they are willing to make the necessary steps towards making realistic reforms to maintain it, to make their system work as best as it can. China can’t simply change overnight, nor should it, if we have learned anything from the Soviet Russia’s collapse…

Let’s try to take that into consideration next time we “cherry-pick” stories about protesters being “silenced” in China… After all, it isn’t like that doesn’t happen here…

UPDATE: Not to criticize Ed Morrissey anymore then I have with this article, but I was a little taken back by his latest posting, this concerning the abolishment of marriage in California. To me this proposition is simply a political move made by an anti-Proposition 8 group, sort of a “if the gays can’t have it, no one can” situation, but not to Ed. He went on about how this libertarian idea appealed to him, discussing “pros” and “cons” of the issue…

As a practical matter, eliminating marriage as a government sanction and forcing couples into partnership contracts would eliminate barriers to adoption and benefits for gay couples, at least in California. It would also avoid the state-recognition issue that the Massachusetts Supreme Court created and which the Defense of Marriage Act attempted to pre-empt. Since the couples would not have government-sanctioned “marriages”, other states would not have to recognize them as such, but the contracts would be enforceable anywhere in the US — probably a lot more enforceable than marriages are today. Those who want to claim “marriage” could have that sanctioned by their religious organizations instead of relying on the state.

Most opposition to this will rest on adoption and the profound nature of changing the way society treats its foundational building block, the family. In practice, DPI might not really change much anyway, since I believe California allows for private adoptions by singles and gay couples, and people are free to arrange their families in such manner anyway without government approval as “marriage” now. However much the libertarian argument appeals to me — and it does — I have to wonder whether we gain much in taking such a step, and what we lose in comparison.

Come on Ed, call it like it is, like the reader who emailed you did. You’re slipping… And if I can tell, so can serious critics…