1. Can’t Keep Thomas Friedman Down
What planet is New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman from? His op-ed this week “Can’t Keep a Bad Idea Down” is hard to take. Believe me I’m not being unfair. I don’t have an axe to grind with Mr. Friedman and I find myself agreeing with some of his points from time to time especially quitting our foreign oil addiction. And I also liked his book “The World is Flat” even though it wasn’t exactly groundbreaking since hedge funds were profiting from a flat world for decades before its printing.
But where exactly is Mr. Friedman going when he says, “I find it dispiriting to read the polls and see candidates, mostly Republicans, leading in various midterm races while promoting many of the very same ideas that got us into this mess.” Has he not been paying attention? If anything Republicans are promoting less spending, less government and less of Obama’s trillion plus dollar deficits.
The problem with Friedman and his Times cohort Paul Krugman is that they will always want to throw more of your money at grand schemes only they and their liberal elite colleagues can love. Friedman wants to gradually cut spending claiming that cutting spending too quickly in a recession didn’t work in the Great Depression. I hate to break it to him but if government keeps growing and spending the way it is, this will be a Greater Recession. Then he claims the financial regulations didn’t go far enough. He can thank Obama for that since he seems to be in awe of the big money players on Wall Street. And Friedman fails to mention how real reform would include the shuttering of Fannie and Freddie who have been kept around thanks to the petrified Democrat, Barney Frank.
In Mr. Friedman’s world, America has no borders and everyone just gets along. He says America’s most important competitive advantage is its ability to attract the world’s best brains. Yet, he seems to forget how much it costs taxpayers to support all these illegal brains. In his world America’s border is a revolving door. And his great idea for Obamacare is let’s see how it works and then fix it. Straight out of the Pelosi playbook of let’s pass it then read it.
Friedman complains about the unions but doesn’t have a solution and fears Democrats will throw more money at them. All true. So here’s an idea: How about cutting back the administrative fat called the teachers unions? Is that too harsh Mr. Friedman? It seems like the liberal elite don’t like making the hard decisions like cutting spending. To them, guys like NJ Governor Chris Christie are too abrasive or former chancellor for D.C. public schools Michelle Rhee’s faculty cuts are too harsh. Friedman’s all too quick to point to how great other countries are and simply doesn’t have a viable plan for America. And once again it strikes me that he feels Americans are slow, dumb and stupid because we’re not up to speed with his and the liberal elite’s grand plan.
2. A Truly Historic Presidency?
You get another example of “what planet are they from?” this time from the new Rolling Stone article “The Case for Obama.” It his headlined: “The charges are familiar: He’s a compromiser who hasn’t stood up to the GOP or Wall Street. But a look at his record reveals something even more startling—A truly historic presidency.” I had to read that twice just to make sure I read it correctly. Talk about out to lunch at the Stone with that truly out to lunch analysis.
The left wants to get much more done. Just ask Van Jones, senior fellow at the Center for American Progress and former green-jobs czar. He tells Rolling Stone in “The Case for Obama” that, “this wasn’t a stimulus bill.” He continues: “A stimulus is what you do when you think you’ve got a short, V-shaped problem in the economy and you want to deliver a jolt to reset to business as usual. A recovery program is what you need when business as usual is no longer possible.” I don’t think Americans want to see your recovery program Van. As it is we’ve been stuck in it for 21 months.
What Rolling Stone fails to understand is Obama’s political capital has run dry. The article continues, “But as effective as Obama has been at implementing progressive policy, he has been lousy at capitalizing on those victories politically. Much of his activist base can’t seem to get over the compromises he made to win such historic reforms, and average Americans are largely clueless about the key achievements of his presidency. Polls show that only 12 percent of Americans realize that Obama cut their taxes; indeed, twice that number thought the president had raised them. Just 29 percent understand that the stimulus boosted the economy, and 81 percent believe that the deficit-slashing health care reform will actually increase the deficit.” Those are key achievements? No wonder Independents and Democrats are fleeing.
3. Why George Soros Could Help Decide Who Wins
You’ll want to read about the Secretary of State Project and why George Soros thinks it’s so important. Connie Hair of Human Events points to Rush Limbaugh’s comments here:
So that’s where the Secretary of State Project got started, and it was rigged. The founder is a bunch of Democrats and George Soros sunk a lot of money into this. They raised a total of, I think, $500,000 for the 2006 secretary of state candidates that they supported. Now, most Americans don’t understand the importance of the secretary of state. I mean, what’s a secretary of state? Most people don’t know what Hillary does except get out of town during elections. Secretary of state generally… Most people think the secretary of state flies over and mediates disputes between the Israelis and Palestinians and goes to funerals. It’s even less knowledge of what a state secretary of state does.
They have no clue. So, you know, people running for that office don’t draw very much attention, not very many donations. Consequently, even a modest injection of cash into those races can elect and be the determining factor in who wins. And so this idea was to get as many Democrats in that position. Regardless who the governor was, regardless the state legislature, get a Democrat holding office as the secretary of state, and then charge vote fraud, do all kinds of things, and have that person be the one who determines the outcome. Now, this is a party. This indicates, illustrates how essential vote fraud is to the Democrat Party, and it’s exactly how we ended up with Al Franken.
So keep a sharp eye on all — and remember, now, what spawned it was not cheating. They just got the idea. Ken Blackwell refused to have recounts and some places. I forget what it was, but 55,000 votes in the state, that is not close but the Democrats thought they got the shaft in Ohio. What they really said was, “If the secretary of state had been a Democrat we might have been able to swing that state for Kerry and won the presidency.” That’s what they realized. So you people keep a sharp eye on secretary of state elections in your state and practically reflexively, automatically vote Republican in every damn one of them, regardless whatever else is going on in the state.
4. Unions Must be Stopped Now
Stopping the unions in the congressional lame duck session is essential. As Connie Hair of Human Events writes,
The likelihood of passage of the bailout through the Senate depends largely on the outcome of the three special elections to fill the remainder of the terms of the late Sen. Robert Byrd and former Sens. Barack Obama and Joe Biden. The victors in these three races will be seated for the lame duck session.
Legislation from Sen. Bob Casey (D-Penn.) is all geared up and ready to go. The Casey bill would put a new line item into the budget, creating a new government fund to perpetuate a permanent avenue for the bailout of private union pensions.
The Democrat-led lame duck session is slated to begin Nov. 15, namely after the elections but before the non-special election members are sworn in on Jan. 3 of next year.
If he wins the West Virginia special election, Manchin would offer a key vote favoring Big Labor in support of a Senate union pension bailout.
