The main stream media is starting to pick up on the obvious fact that the Obama administration is a bunch of incompetent jerks.  Last night I watched Anderson Cooper report on the Gulf Coast damage being caused by the oil spill.  Most, but not all, of his anger was vented toward BP.  Even Anderson Cooper took a couple of weak shots at Obama. 

 But, during the program someone came up and accused BP of staging the illusion of a massive cleanup effort to coincide during President Obama’s visit.

 http://newsbusters.org/blogs/noel-sheppard/2010/05/29/cnn-airs-allegations-bp-bused-gulf-workers-scam-obama

 Anderson Cooper was outraged that BP would pull such a stunt.  The problem is that it doesn’t appear that BP had anything to do with it.  It turns out all those workers were brought to the site in school buses.  Hmmm. I wonder how BP got control of school buses.  The alarm bells began to ring.  I thought about it and it became quickly obvious that BP would be very unlikely to pull this kind of stunt.  First, they are too busy trying to stop the leak.  Second, does Anderson Cooper really think BP could try to fool the President of the United States by providing a mock clean-up crew?   Please!  If he believes that, he believes the Obama administration to be a bunch of buffoons.  (On second thought – he may have a point)  The President was there specifically to show the world that he was in charge.  He even delayed his 50^th vacation this year for nearly three hours to show how much he cared.  If Obama could be fooled by such an obvious publicity stunt that he is even more incompetent than we think.  I would bet that the mock clean-up crew was not there to fool the President; it was there to fool CNN.  And with reporters the caliber of Anderson Cooper, it worked brilliantly.  Anderson Cooper apparently failed to realize that it was Obama who was trying to pretend he was doing something and it was Obama who would benefit by giving the appearance of a massive clean-up effort.  If the school buses weren’t a clue, the hazmat suits were a dead give away.  Sadly, this is pretty typical stuff for a President who routinely uses staged town hall meetings to trick people into thinking he has public support.

 I used to think the msm media was primarily impacted by the bias.  Now I realize that a lot of this is just plain stupidity.

 TDM

The Obama administration posted the Sestak/Clinton confessional document on the Friday before Memorial Day.  President Obama was conveniently in Lousiana taking a first hand look at the damage from the BP oil spill.  The goal of the Obama administration is clearly to consider the story closed.  I am sure that you are going to hear Robert Gibbs pretend the confessional is the end all and try desperately to change the subject.  Who knows, with the biased and incredibly stupid msm they might even get away with this.

But if I were in the Obama administration I wouldn’t start popping champagne corks just yet.  This clearly doctored up story is so transparent that even the liberal media is likely to notice at least some odor.  Bill Clinton is furious at the Obama administration for the way they treated Hillary during the election.  Does anyone really believe that Bill graciously offered to intervene for the good of the team?  Please!  Even if this story is true, it looks terrible and this pathetic, unbelievable milktoast version may still constitute a felony.

Here’s the story.   Clinton and Obama have lunch on Thursday.  The White House then talks to Sestak’s brother, who is also his attorney.  Then after three months of stonewalling and denials, suddenly the White House moves with lightening speed to “set the record straight.”  Only a true Kool-Aid drinker would buy this load of crap.  This is like the guy who gets stopped for drunk driving.  The cop asks him if he’s been drinking.  If the guy says: “yes, I had a couple of beers,” you just know he probably downed a twelve pack minimum.  It’s the same here.  If they admitted to this, the truth is almost certain to be much more serious.

It is vital to remember that the White House was playing let’s make a deal with Specter at the time.  The entire Obama legislative agenda was hanging by a thread, or should I say the Specter of a thread.  Remember the Lousiana Purchase and the Cornhusker kickback.  No expense was being spared to get the Annointed One his moment of glory.  If Specter was not on board, they got bubkis.   Specter only agreed to switch parties and turn Democrat because he feared losing in a Republican primary.  The Obama administration had to provide Specter with some assurance that he would coast through the Democratic  primary without a major challenge.  That is why Specter is now so royally pissed.  Bill Clinton making this limp wristed offer wouldn’t come close to making the cut.  Odds are that the offer was a lot more substantial and it wasn’t delivered second hand.

In addition, there is a nearly identical accusation regarding the Colorado Senate race.

http://newsbusters.org/

Remarkably similar story.  Kind of consistent with Rod Blagojevich’s comment:  “A Senate seat is a f…..in valuable thing, you don’t give it away for nothing. “ 

Right now, somewhere in a major news room there is a bright young journalist or newsman who dreams of being the next Bob Woodard.  Looks like he or she just got their chance.  This story is just too juicy and just to obvious to ignore. 

Sir Walter Scott:  “Oh what a tangled web we weave, when first we practice to deceive!”

TDM

It appears we now know the official White House version of the Sestak affair.  They are apparently going to claim that Clinton delivered the offer of an unpaid advisory board position:

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2010/05/exclusive_white_house_asked_cl_1.html

This is consistent with what the NYT is going to report.  It was apparently the Foreign Intelligence Advisory Board

http://voices.washingtonpost.com/plum-line/2010/05/what_about_the_job_offer.html

If this is accurate, then this will have very little impact on the Obama administration, other than some embarrassment.  However, it will be devastating to Sestak.  It makes him look like an arrogant idiot. (Seems about right!)

However, the real impact on this situation is that the Obama administration finally was forced to give a straight answer to a question rather than the vague non-specific answers for which they are famous.  Ultimately that could be the most damaging long term impact of this story.

There are also obvious conflicts between what Sestak said and this story.  This only describes one incident, involving President Clinton.  It will be interesting to see if this is the entire story.  This seems a little weak to me.  The Obama administration definitely wanted Sestak out of the race.  They were pretty desperate to keep Specter happy.   If this was their best effort at getting him out of the Senate race it is easy to see why it failed.  This story is probably true, but it may not be the entire story.  One thing is sure, there is a lot of scrambling going on.  The White House called Sestak’s brother, who is a lawyer, to discuss this with him.  It would be very interesting to learn what exactly was discussed.  This has the ugly odor of a cover-up.  I wonder if the main stream media will notice.  Right now, it will be important to learn exactly how Sestak responds.

This has the classic pattern of a cover-up.  Witness A refuses to give his side of the story until he knows exactly what Witness B said.  That is the way people act when they are trying to make sure they are both telling the same lie.  Perhaps the real question is not what Sestak was offered to drop out, but what he was offered to cover for the White House.  My guess is that Obama is about to make some very expensive fund raising trips to Pennsylvania.

TDM

The Sestak Affair (bribegate?) has the potential to destroy the Obama Presidency.  Here are the facts that we know as of this date.  On February 18, 2010, Joe Sestak was being interviewed by a radio talk show host, Larry Kane.  Kane had been hearing a lot of rumors about Sestak being offered an appointment as Secretary of the Navy, in exchange for him dropping out of the Pennsylvania Senate race, clearing the way for Arlen Specter.  Here is the question, and the answer:

http://www.larrykane.com/2010/02/18/sestak-surprises-me-with-a-bombshell-statement/

Kane:  “Is it true that you were offered a high ranking job in the administration in a bid to get you to drop out of the primary against Arlen Specter?”

Sestak: “Yes:

That would be bad enough, but Sestak continued talking:

“Let me just say that, both here in Pennsylvania and down there, I was called quite a few times. And all I said is, look, I felt when a deal was made, that it was hurting the democratic process. I got into this because I think that deal started getting us off the track where the Democratic Party should go. I would never get out for a deal.”

The media sat on this story until after the primary election.  Perhaps they thought Specter would win and the problem would just fade away.  But, Specter didn’t win, Sestak did.  That creates a problem.  It is pretty obvious that either Sestak is lying, or someone in the Obama administration tried to bribe him out of the Senate race in a failed effort to save Arlen Specter.  Even the main stream media has figured that out.  Roberts Gibbs is getting pointed questions on this, which he has simply refused to answer.  Both David Gregory and Bob Schieffer asked Sestak directly if the Obama White House offered him a job to end his primary challenge.  His response was yes.  Following is the quote from the Schieffer interview:

Schieffer:  “Did the White House offer you a position in the administration if you would not run?”

 Sestak replied: “Yes, I was asked that question months after it happened. And I felt an obligation to answer it honestly. And I said yes.”

Today, President Obama was asked about this by Fox News.  Following is the transcript:

Secondarily, can you tell the American public, sir, what your White House did or did not offer Congressman Sestak to not enter the Democratic senatorial primary? And how will you meet your levels of expressed transparency and ethics to convey that answer to satisfy what appear to be bipartisan calls for greater disclosure about that matter? Thank you.

THE PRESIDENT: There will be an official response shortly on the Sestak issue, which I hope will answer your questions.

Q From you, sir?

THE PRESIDENT: You will get it from my administration. And it will be coming out — when I say “shortly,” I mean shortly. I don’t mean weeks or months. With respect to the first –

Q Can you assure the public it was ethical and legal, sir?

THE PRESIDENT: I can assure the public that nothing improper took place. But, as I said, there will be a response shortly on that issue.

Clearly the Obama administration is in full damage control mode.  Note that Obama did not deny offering Sestak a job.  He just said that nothing improper took place.  That is the spin the White House would like to sell.  Several top Democrats are saying this is just politics. 

If the main stream media agrees, this story will quickly fade away.  But the problem for Obama is that even some Democrats are unwilling to ignore such a blatant attempt at bribery.  Offering someone an appointment to be Secretary of the Navy, in exchange for dropping out of an election is difficult to spin away.  Keep in mind that Rod Blagojevich is on trial for trying to obtain a job for himself in exchange for appointing someone to Obama’s old Senate Seat.  Prosecutors in that case are not exactly amused.

Just recently Dick Durban joined Republicans in demanding an answer.  That is significant.  Durban is the Senate Majority Whip.  He was one of the first key Democratic players to back Obama.  If he turns on the Obama Administration, that is big trouble in River City.

Also, don’t be surprised if Arlen Specter joins the chorus. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q6aDsdJofUk&feature=youtu.be

Specter is already on record as saying that offering Sestak a job in exchange for dropping out of the race would be a felony.  Specter is royally pissed that he lost his Senate seat.  That is why he switched from Republican to Democrat.  He is angry at the Obama administration because he felt he did not get enough support.  He is even more angry at Sestak.  So, from Specters viewpoint, he probably really wants to pursue this.

If he proves that Sestak is lying, that is good for Specter, because it may even put him back in the Senate race.  At least he would get the pleasure of sticking it to Sestak.   In addition, Specter is angry at Obama because the White House ignored Sestak’s claim.  Specter wanted the White House to take on Sestak over this.  He believes that Sestak got unfair political mileage from making this charge, and the White House let him get away with it.  Now, even if Sestak’s story holds up, Specter will get some revenge against the Obama administration for throwing him under the bus.  Win – win.

It is important to remember that Specter is a former prosecutor and he has the potential to be a formidable legal advocate on this case.   I wonder if Specter would be interested in being Secretary of the Navy?  (Probably too obvious)

Sestak is hardly a saint.  When Admiral Mike Mullens took over as Chief of Naval Operations in July of 2005, one of his first official acts was to fire Admiral Sestak.  Sestak had been a Deputy Chief of Naval Operations, a three star admiral position.  The reason given by Mullens was “poor command climate.”  This resulted in Sestak being demoted to a two star admiral and ultimately resulted in his resignation from the Navy. 

Since Admiral Mullens is pretty highly regarded, it is pretty difficult to argue with a straight face that Obama offered Sestak the position of Secretary of the Navy based on his outstanding performance.

Here is what I expect.  First, the Obama administration will stall as long as possible.  Then they will try to issue some vague statement saying no one did anything wrong.  They will refuse to provide specific details, based on some vague legal reasoning.  Odds are that Holder will be asked to deliver this turkey. 

The Republicans are going to push for answers and are likely to get more and aggressive.  If other people besides Durban and Specter get on board, then it will become impossible for the Obama administration to sweep this one under the rug. 

The liberal left is starting to worry.  They are consoling themselves that this is just about politics, so no one will care.  But, so was Watergate.  It was a two-bit burglaryof a political campaign headquarters.  What was new about that?   It didn’t matter, until it did.  Then it mattered a lot.

http://www.salon.com/news/politics/2010_elections/index.html?story=/politics/war_room/2010/05/27/joe_sestak_story_will_not_die

Other liberals are desperately trying the standard: “everybody does it defense.”  But the problem is that everybody else was smarter about it.

 http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2010/05/27/sestak-scandal-is-busines_n_592012.html

It is likely that every administration has cut political deals to solve problems.  But, there is a fine line between politics and bribery. The real problem for Obama is that his tendency to reveal absolutely nothing about anything has come back to haunt him.  Remember that Nixon wasn’t even accused of a crime with regard to the Watergate burglary.  All his problems resulted from trying to cover it up.  Sound familiar? 

The Sharks are circling and Obama is bleeding like a stuck hog.  Don’t be surprised to see a feeding frenzy.  Frankly, right now, I honestly think Obama would rather be answering questions about the BP oil spill.  It is that bad.

 TDM

The Obama administration is totally inept with regard to foreign policy, but in no case is that worst than with regard to North Korea.   Unfortunately this incompetence has the potential to turn an annoyance into a major disaster.  There is little doubt that North Korea sunk a South Korean ship.  North Korea has been doing stuff like this for decades.   North Korea must be restrained, but this is not worth setting off a war.   There were two major incidents during 1968 and 1969.  The first was the capture of the USS Pueblo.   Lyndon Johnson was President.  He huffed and he puffed, but ultimately did nothing.  Ultimately, it was Johnson who backed down.  The second incident, which is described below, was probably a direct result of the poor handling of the Pueblo incident by Johnson.  The real tragedy of the USS Pueblo is that Commander Bucher did not realize the importance of the equipment and the personnel on that ship.  It was a Naval Security Guard vessel conducting operations so classified that the ship commander was not briefed.   If he knew what was at stake, he probably would not have allowed the ship to be boarded, regardless of casualties.

 http://www.usspueblo.org/Welcome.html

There was a similar incident in 1967 with another ship, the USS Liberty when it was attacked by Israel.  

 In that case the Commander, Captain McGonagle fought back, losing 34 crewmembers but saving the ship.  He was awarded the Medal of Honor.    

http://www.gtr5.com/

The second was the shoot down of an EC121 in 1969.  I am very familiar with this case, because two of the crew members went to language school in Monterey at the same time I was there.  What was especially sad about that case was that it didn’t have to happen.  A USAFSS listening post had picked up traffic indicating that the North Koreans were practicing an attack on the Navy plane.  (It flew the same route on a regular basis).  The USAFSS tried to warn the Navy and requested a direct communication channel with the plane.  That was denied.  The USAFSS linguists at OSAN picked up the attack and desperately tried to warn the EC121 crew.  But, because they had to go through the Navy communications loop, the warning was received by the EC121 only 1 minute before it was shot down.  The entire 31 man crew was killed.  (I learned this directly from the linguists involved.   My roommate at that time was a Korean linguist.  Two of the people killed were in his Korean language class.)

President Nixon took a very low key public approach to what amounted to an act of war.  He ordered an immediate halt of all aerial reconnaissance missions, but he rescinded the order three days later.  From then on these missions flew with fighter escorts. 

http://www.dean-boys.com/shootdown/shoot.htm

Nixon made some serious mistakes with regard to the EC121 incident, but ultimately he got it right.  He did not over react, but he also did not ignore it.  He resumed the flights, but made sure it wouldn’t happen again.  By this tactic he was letting North Korea know that this would not be tolerated, but he was careful to avoid turning a very unfortunate event into a shooting war.  He handled this in a way that did not cause the North Koreans to lose face.    He even allowed a cover story leaked claiming that this was the result of a mistake by A North Korean ground controller.   Remember that Nixon was the first U.S. President to open up communications with China.  Nixon understood face.

The problem with the Obama administration is that they are making a lot of threats that no one takes seriously.   Hopefully this will end quietly with the normal embarrassment associated with any Obama administration attempt at an effective foreign policy.   Some of our actions, such as turning up loud speakers on the DMZ, just appear to be silly nonsense. 

http://www.ft.com/cms/s/0/1c0d9e4c-6884-11df-96f1-00144feab49a.html

http://www.news.com.au/world/us-warns-north-korea-to-stop-threats-after-warship-attack/story-e6frfkyi-1225871843894

But the real problem is that has the potential to cause North Korea to lose face.  That could result in North Korean feeling it has to go to war to retain its honor.  Notice how China is condemning the sinking of the South Korean ship, but is not specifically accusing North Korea of doing the sinking.  China does not want this unfortunately situation to result in a war which would result in an unimaginable loss of life.  I suspect that this will cool down shortly, primarily because the Obama administration is almost certain to back down.  There is virtually no chance that China will support any significant retaliation against North Korea.  While North Korea is definitely unpleasant, they really do not represent a serious threat to us, unless we cause them to lose face and blunder into a very dangerous military confrontation.  But, if the Obama administration continues to escalate the tension, in a meaningless gesture, the results could be catastrophic.  North Korea has an enormous military and many people believe their leader, Kim Jung II is terminally ill.   We have enough challenges without adding an unnecessary war in the mix.  Let’s hope calmer heads prevail. 

Ultimately, it is about face.

TDM

The Obama administration has totally botched the handled of the BP oil spill.  This is so bad that all of the networks are finally starting to challenge the administration.  This is likely to be the lead story on all the networks this evening.  Obama did a nice job reading his TelePrompTer and angrily pointing his finger at BP and all the other evil oil companies.  However, he did nothing to actually fix the problem.  Now we are more than 30 days past the event, oil is starting to pollute our shores and the Obama administration has no answers, has no solutions and can’t even give consistent answers to the most important question:  “Who, exactly, is in charge?”  They don’t even know where to start looking for a solution.

This would have been handled very differently by the Bush administration for one simple reason.  The Bush administration had Dick Cheney.  Dick Cheney was the former CEO of Haliburton, and you can bet your bottom dollar that George Bush would have called him on day one and asked him to find out what was going on.  It would not have taken someone like Cheney long to figure out what was going on and to get in contact with people who would know how to deal with it.  It also wouldn’t have taken long for him to get authorization from George Bush to do whatever it took to fix the problem.  (Of course regardless of what Bush did the msm would have accused him of incompetence)

This is the real problem with the Obama administration.  They don’t have a Dick Cheney.  They don’t have anybody in their administration with experience at solving real world problems.   None of the cabinet members, with the possible exception of Secretary of Defense Gates, demonstrates any leadership skill at all.  Gates is a hard core CIA and military guy, but even he has no real world experience in handing this type of problem.  In addition, he doesn’t appear to be heavily involved.   Instead, they’ve got a bunch of politically correct lawyers frothing at the bit over who they can sue. 

Even if you cut them some slack for doing nothing for eight days, by April 29, 2010 it was obvious that this situation was a mega disaster. 

http://www.whistleblower.org/blog/31-2010/534-troubling-details-emerge-about-bps-oil-platform-explosion

If Obama had a lick of sense, which he doesn’t, he would call Dick Cheney and beg for help.  After giving him an earful, Cheney probably would reluctantly accept the assignment.    After all Dick Cheney, unlike Obama, has a long record of putting the country first. 

At this point, it is very unlikely that anyone who really understands this stuff is going to volunteer for the job.  The person who takes on this puppy is likely to be faced with a raging out of control Rahm Emmanuel demanding the impossible while failing to grasp the enormity of the challenge.  In all fairness, it is hard to bribe your way out of an oil spill.  In addition, the odds are pretty high that anyone involved is going to get more blame than gratitude.  

The Obama administration needs a Cheney.  Instead they have replaced him with a “Chain (Cheney) of Fools.”

TDM

There are basically two kinds of people in this world.  Those who learn from their mistakes and those who don’t.  Everyone has successes and failures.  But it is the response to failure that really counts.  People who learn from their mistakes are the ones most likely to succeed.  For example Thomas Edison was not exactly the smartest person trying to develop an electric light bulb.  He just did the most experiments.  Finally, one of them worked.  But there is another kind of person, that does not learn from their mistakes.  These people go through life bitter, disappointed and angry.    Because they are not able to recognize their own mistakes, they are doomed to blame others.   Sometimes there are entire classes of people like this.  They are often referred to as a victim class.  The victim class expends most of its energy at expressing anger toward the people they blame for their failures in life. 

While doing some recent research it became obvious to me that the biggest victim class of all is the Islamic World.  Anyone who studies history quickly learns that virtually all of the major achievements in art, music, education, science and industry have come from the West for hundreds of years.  The Islamic world is well aware of this.  They are envious of the success of the West.  But, it goes beyond simple envy.  It has morphed into hatred.  Some of the most important leaders in the Islamic world believe that their culture and history was stolen from them.  They view the West as an evil force that used its military power to dominate the Islamic world, take its culture and history and use it against those who created it.  This was bad enough, but then the West discovered oil.  They plundered the oil from the Islamic world and used it to become even more powerful while their citizens became fat and wealthy.  That is why they hate us so much.  They consider themselves the ultimate victim class and we are the ultimate villains. 

The following speech was given [T1] on Radio Islam by Iman Khamenei on April 21, 2001.  This was about 4 ½ months prior to 9-11. 

http://radioislam.org/khamenei/message.htm

He believes that wealth of the Islamic world has been plundered:

Today the wealth of the Islamic world is plundered. The precious sources of intellectual and cultural heritage are hidden by the propaganda of those who attack Islam. Under the false propagation of cultural attacks, young talents and minds are taken out, or their energy is wasted in political and military conflicts. Carelessness and moral irresponsibility are spread to people’s lives, education and sports, using the most advanced means of communication.

This is not just envy of Western prosperity, it is a conviction that this prosperity was gained by the plundering of the Islamic world.

Read the following article by Charles Krauthammer with this world view in mind:

The fruits of weakness

By Charles Krauthammer

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/05/20/AR2010052003885.html

Nor is this retreat by inadvertence. This is retreat by design and, indeed, on principle. It’s the perfect fulfillment of Obama’s adopted Third World narrative of American misdeeds, disrespect and domination from which he has come to redeem us and the world. Hence his foundational declaration at the U.N. General Assembly last September that “No one nation can or should try to dominate another nation” (guess who’s been the dominant nation for the last two decades?) and his dismissal of any “world order that elevates one nation or group of people over another.” (NATO? The West?)

Just a few days ago, at the nuclear arms summit, Obama said the following:

“It is a vital national security interest of the United States to reduce these conflicts because whether we like it or not, we remain a dominant military superpower, and when conflicts break out, one way or another we get pulled into them,” Obama said. “And that ends up costing us significantly in terms of both blood and treasure.” 

Some of us have wondered why Obama has apologized for the U.S. all over the world.  Most of us are proud of our country.  We are proud of our prosperity.  We are proud of our freedom.  We are proud of our military strength that has been used to spread freedom and democracy around the world.  We make no apology for success and we cannot understand a President who does not understand that.

But Obama clearly does not share that view.  It is becoming increasingly apparent that he is embarrassed by our military strength.  He considers our military superpower status to be a burden.  He does not believe that any nation can or should try to dominate another nation.  He does not appear to believe that the American way of life is in any way superior to other world views.  Perhaps this explains why he has hesitated to even bring up human rights violations.  It explains why he warms up to people like Fidel Castro and Hugo Chavez, while he ignores and insults our allies like Great Britain and France.   He has ignored the subjugation of women in the Islamic world.  He demands that we support the right of people to follow Islam, but has never suggested that the Islamic world tolerate the freedom to consider Christianity, or any other religion other than Islam.  But perhaps it is more than not wanting the U.S. to dominate the world.  Perhaps he believes, as does Iman Khamanei, that our military strength itself is unacceptable because it obtained by unjustly plundering the Islamic world? 

It does not end with military superiority.  Obama is also embarrassed by our economic superiority:

http://afp.google.com/article/ALeqM5h-wpxs1Re-8vx2Zk5xnYygW1W67w

Most of us are proud to live in a country where the American dream is a real possibility.  We love the fact that ordinary working people can afford to buy that SUV, they can afford to eat as much as they want and they can afford to keep their homes at a comfortable 72 degrees all the time.  Obama, on the other hand, finds this disgusting:

“We can’t drive our SUVs and eat as much as we want and keep our homes on 72 degrees at all times … and then just expect that other countries are going to say OK,”

Obama is implementing a strategy that he admits will result in skyrocketing energy costs:

http://newsbusters.org/blogs/kerry-picket/2008/11/02/obama-energy-prices-will-skyrocket

Obama:  “When I was asked earlier about the issue of coal…under my plan of a cap and trade system, electricity rates would necessarily skyrocket…even regardless of what I say about whether coal is good or bad, because I’m capping greenhouse gasses, coal power plants, natural gas…you name it…whatever the plants were, whatever the industry was, they would have to retro-fit their operations.”

Obama says that he is doing this to protect us from global warming.  But perhaps the real reason is that he believes that the United States has unfairly exploited the rest of the world to obtain that American lifestyle.  He is embarrassed by our prosperity.  This also is consistent with the opinion of Iman Khamenei.  The following excerpt is from the same speech cited previously:

The resources of the people are turned to increasing the wealth of inimical oil companies and treasuries. The enemies get fatter each day, while in the heart of the Islamic world and in various parts of Asia, Africa and Europe, the lashes of cruelty of the are felt by millions of Muslims.

We do not know Obama’s core values.  We know virtually nothing about what the man really believes.  The only thing certain is that his personal background is very different from that of most Americans.  Because of that, we must try and determine his core values by his studying his decisions. Regardless of his motivation, Obama’s policies are rapidly reducing the strength of our military.  His economic policies are also quickly bringing the American lifestyle more in line with the rest of the world.  What is the real impact of refusing to drill for oil, refusing to build nuclear power plants and banning the use of our coal resources?  Although Obama is naïve and inexperienced, even he must understand that there is no chance that wind, solar and biotech sources of energy can supply enough energy to support the American lifestyle.  The result of his energy policy will be to make foreign oil more and more valuable.  While our lifestyle and economy declines, the oil rich Islamic world will prosper.  I would hazard a guess that Iman Khamenei would consider this to be a good result.

TDM

In 1997, Sebastian Junger wrote published a book about a furious storm that occurred in 1991.  The title of his book was “The Perfect Storm.”  He was inspired by meteorologist Bob Case from the Boston office of the National Weather Service.  Case described this storm as the confluence of three different events that created what he called the perfect situation to generate a major storm.  There was warm from a low-pressure system coming from one direction, combined with a flow of cool and dry air generated by a high-pressure system from another direction, that merged with tropical moisture from Hurricane Grace.  One thing is sure, it was a major storm with some reports of seas exceeding 100 ft.

Today, the Obama administration is facing the real possibility of a perfect political storm, much of it generated by its own mismanagement, arrogance, and incompetence.  We have a foreign policy that can only be described as staggering from failure to failure.  Things are so bad in so many places that it is hard to choose which is worse, but Afghanistan is certainly in the running.  Our commanders no longer even discuss victory: 

 http://www.washingtontimes.com/news/2010/may/20/three-way-stalemate-in-afghanistan/

Things are deteriorating rapidly and the idiotic rules of engagement by the Obama administration are making a bad situation worse.  The following article does a good job of describing the problem.   What a shock to learn that trying to win a war by being careful to not hurt the enemy is not proving to be terribly effective:

http://defensetech.org/2010/05/19/intense-firefight-in-eastern-afghanistan-shows-limits-of-strict-rules-of-engagement/

Unfortunately I predict numerous opportunities for the new “Courageous Restraint” medal, most of which are likely to be awarded posthumously.

The economy, contrary to recent press reports, shows zero signs of recovery.  Instead there are more and more signs that the entire western world is drowning in debt.  Even Obama administration officials are admitting that we cannot sustain current debt levels.  It was stunning to hear Obama lecture Spain about the need to control spending.  I wonder if he removed all the mirrors from the White House?  The Obama administration still plans to turn things around by increasing regulation and spending more money.  (Why not, his previous plans have worked so well!)  More and more economists are no longer predicting a downturn, they are predicting a crash.  Some experts are estimating that the stock market may be over-valued by 40%.  That seems a little extreme, until you realize the same experts were the ones predicting the housing bubble.  Some are even predicting a crash within hours:

http://www.cnbc.com/id/37233453

Here on the home front, the Obama administration is pursuing policies that are total opposed by a huge percentage of the American people.  Health care reform was jammed down our throats, in the middle of the night.  It is an unmitigated disaster.  No one is even pretending that this is working out well.  The main stream media rarely mentions health care reform any more.

The Obama administration is now focused on ignoring the public sentiment toward illegal immigration.  MSNBC conducted a poll which resulted in 51% of the people supporting the Arizona immigration law.  (Odds are the questions was something like: “how do you feel about this new Arizona law that encourages police to use racial profiling to identify illegal aliens?)  They were distressed that the result was this high, for a law they considered to be so terrible, but it is actually worse than that.  You see they ignored the fact than an additional 9% of respondents said the Arizona law didn’t go far enough.  That means a poll run by the official voice of the Obama administration verifies that 60% of the American public totally disagrees with him on this subject.  So what does Obama do?  He doubles down by personally attacking the Arizona law, only to have several key administration officials sheepishly admit that they have not even read the actual law.  It just “seems” wrong.  Incredibly, the Obama administration even apologized to China, who has a pathetic human rights record itself, for this shameful Arizona law.  The final straw was when Obama invited Mexico President Calderon to visit the White House and not only let Calderon rip the Arizona law, he joined in with a few amen’s of his own.  This idiotic display had to stick in the craw of a lot of people.

 Of course all those personal scandals aren’t going away either.  The lastest is the bailout of the ShoreBank in Chicago which has close connections with Obama and particularly with Valerie Jarrett.

 http://www.foxbusiness.com/story/markets/industries/finance/lenders-agree-prop-ailing-shorebank/

 The banks providing this very convenient bailout just happen to be the same banks that got billions from the Obama administration.  Pure coincidence!

 Now, the BP oil spill may turn out to be a far bigger disaster than is being reported.  Some scientists are estimating that the well is releasing 95,000  barrells of oil every day.  That is 20 times higher than BP, or the Obama administration, was reporting.  The Obama administration has done absolutely nothing to solve this problem, and they don’t appear to have anything resembling a plan to deal with it.  So far the primary Obama response has been to launch a major finger pointing attack at BP and others for “finger pointing.” (mirror mirror?)

When you add all these things together, the result is a perfect political storm.  Notice how the main stream media rarely praises Obama any more.  They are too busy trying to explain why Elena Kagan, who’s own writing prove she is a radical, left-wing socialist should not be considered a radical, left-wing socialist.  After all, just like Obama, she has such a nice smile.

We all need to fasten our seat belts because there is a real possibility that the darkest days for our economy are ahead of us.  In addition the recent surge in terrorist attacks shows two disturbing trends.  First, there are more and more attacks.  (So far: none from the violent Tea Party advocates)  Second, we have only avoided disaster by the combination of a luck and incredibly stupid terrorists.  Sadly, the odds of a successful terrorist attack are probably higher now than they were prior to 9-11.

It would take a really skilled an experienced captain of the ship of state to sail through the perfect storm that is developing.  Unfortunately Obama is neither skilled or experienced.  In addition, he doesn’t appear to be considering changing direction any time soon.  

 TDM

Obama is scheduled to speak at the Kalamazoo Central High School commencement:

http://www.mlive.com/news/kalamazoo/index.ssf/2010/05/obama_may_personally_greet_eac.html

According to this article:

Seniors are being asked to provide their birthdates, Social Security numbers and citizen status to the Secret Service so background checks could be performed. Such a check is required for anyone who gets within an arm’s length of the president, students were told at their senior breakfast Friday

I wonder if anyone in the main stream media will pick up on the obvious. 

The current U.S. Census form asks a lot of questions, but it does not ask if you are a citizen.

Obama is complaining loudly because Arizona is asking some people to verify their citizenship.

The Secret Service is demanding people prove their citizenship before getting the chance to shake hands with Obama.

If I were in Arizona, I would be calling for a boycott of the Obama administration for daring to force people to prove their citizenship just to shake hands with Obama.  This certainly seems like it has the potential to result in racial profiling. 

How ironic that more checking is done with regard to the citizenship of the students at Kalamazoo Central than with regard to President Obama himself. 

At this point, it is not clear that Obama would be able to get clearance to shake hands with himself.    

TDM

Yes, the Obama administration is that stupid.   Their handling of the new Arizona immigration law has removed any lingering doubt.  Attorney General Holder admitted that he never actually “read” the Arizonia Immigration law that is causing so much anxiety.  Then,  Homeland Security Secretary Napolitano admitted that she also had never actually “read” the Arizona immigration law.  Finally, the UN Human Right representative was on “On The Record with  Greta  – Fox News” and she asked him to please point out what exact provision in the law is a problem.  He did not have an answer, other than that the law “seems” to be a potential problem.

Assistant Secretary of State Michael Posner went to China to talk about human rights.  He brought up the Arizona immigration law to show to the Chinese that we have human rights problems too:

http://michellemalkin.com/2010/05/17/who-is-michael-posner-and-why-is-he-apologizing-to-china/

The following quote from Mr. Posner is impossible to defend:

Q Did the recently passed Arizona immigration law come up? And if so, did they bring it up? Or did you bring it up?

MR. POSNER: We brought it up early and often. It was mentioned in the first session and as a troubling trend in our society, and an indication that we have to deal with issues of discrimination or potential discrimination. And these are issues very much being debated in our own society.

Q Did they — did they discuss anything about their concerns about Chinese visiting in Arizona? Any concerns raised?

MR. POSNER: No, that was not raised.

We gave an apology to China, the country that just may have the worst human rights record in the world, because Arizona dared to enforce existing immigration laws.   The last question is precious.  Are the Chinese worried about visiting Arizona?  Please!  Try visiting China without permission.  (But make sure your will is up-to-date first). 

Then, Obama does the following:

Obama doesn’t take questions
at Freedom of Press Act signing
CNN, by Xuan Thai

http://www1.voanews.com/english/news/usa/Obama-Signs-Law-Supporting-Global-Press-Freedom-93967824.html

After reading from his teleprompter speech, President Obama was asked if he would take a couple of questions:

http://politicalticker.blogs.cnn.com/2010/05/17/obama-doesnt-take-questions-at-freedom-of-press-act-signing/?fbid=5DkndMAJCc-

Obama responded:

“You’re certainly free to ask the question.”  I won’t be answering, I’m not doing a press conference today, but we will be seeing you in the course of the week.”

The irony of refusing to answer questions at an event designed to show his support for freedom of the press was so obvious that even CNN noticed.   The news media is on to Obama and it is just a matter of time before this explodes.  There are just too many stories about Obama just waiting to be told.  All that is necessary is one story to hit the main stream media, and it will go viral.  What little public support he has currently will literally disintegrate. 

The Obama administration is leaking at a faster rate than the BP oil well.   Just watch the following ad running in John Murtha’s old congressional district.  Remember that this district is highly democratic.  These ads have already succeeded in making a race that democrats expected to win in a walk, into a cliff hanger.  If the republican candidate wins this race, it will reverberate around the country louder than the Scott Brown victory in Massachusetts:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EnHiN6Pwwos

Now imagine yourself a democrat, running for re-election this November. Imagine several more months of Pelosi being Pelosi.  Then imagine watching this ad played over and over and over again by your opponent.  Your only hope is that people get so sick of seeing it that they get angry at the person running it. 

What has really happened is that it is no longer possible to even pretend that the Obama administration is competent.  It has been obvious, to those who were paying attention, that this was true from day one.  But the main stream media was so busy giving glowing results about Obama the brilliant that they failed to see that he was botching everything.  What a shock!  The most naïve, incompetent, inexperienced person ever elected President of the Unites States is turning out to be the most naïve, incompetent, inexperienced President ever.   

A lot of people who supported Obama tried to pretend there was no problem.  Obama might not have been great, but they could not bring themselves to think he was “that” bad.  But, he is that bad.  He is that radical.  The really difficult task is to find someone in his administration that is not radical.  He is also that incompetent.  We have an administration full of political correctness, but don’t appear to have anyone capable of actually doing their job.  I tried hard to think of one area where things have improved since Obama took office.  I really cannot think of a single accomplishment.

I do have a suggestion for fixing the BP oil leak.  Just bring the entire Obama administration out to the site on a large barge and give them all really long straws.  This could really work, because they all suck!

TDM