Roundup; Debate Reactions The Morning After

The media are doing their very best to spin this,cooking the polls. But anyone who watched the debate knows that Donald Trump won a stunning and unexpected victory.

The nearest thing I can compare this to is Richard Nixon's famous Checkers speech, when he ran as Eisenhower's running mate in 1952. It involved the press, who hated Nixon with a passion, busting Nixon for a so-called 'slush fund' set up by his supporters to cover certain expenses. Lots of politicians then and now have exactly the same setup(today, they're called 'leadership PACs'). Nixon's was fairly modest and innocuous, but because it was Nixon, the press went nuts, Eisenhower pretty much left Nixon twisting in the wind and it was fully expected that Nixon's political life was over and he would be forced off the ticket.

Instead, Nixon went on national TV, leveled with the American people and made his case directly to them. The perception of Richard Nixon - and the polls - changed virtually over night, and all of a sudden there was Ike Eisenhower talking about how proud he was of his running mate and how glad he was to have him.

Don't expect the media polls to reflect this, but things have changed for Trump overnight as well. here are a few snippets and reactions...



This is Joe Scarborough and Mika on MSNBC talking about the debate. Neither are Trump fans,  and I agree with both of them for a change. Scarborough is totally correct about the political impact of someone saying to Hillary's face what people have wanted to say to her for years, and Mika is totally right about the spineless nature of those Republicans who abandoned Trump over a locker room conversation.

Joe Scarborough seems to think no undecided voters were swayed, but below, Frank Luntz's focus group  of undecided voters seems to contradict him:






Rudy Giuliani was predictably happy over last night's debate...




And here, gives us an interesting sidelight on how the Clintons tried to pressure the debate committee...



El Rushbo was actually astonished by how well Trump did...Trump exceeded his expectations.



unsuccessfully, I might add.

As an example of how the media is trying to spin this, here is CNN's Dana Bash and Wolf Blitzer:



Ah hah hah! Trump never said he'd throw Hillary in jail. What he said is that he'd have his Attorney General appoint a special prosecutor to investigate her myriad scandals. And it's not just the e-mails and her illegal private server, or her willful and knowing destruction of evidence which had already been subpoenaed, AKA obstruction of justice. There's also the open collusion between the DOJ, the White House, the FBI, and Hillary herself in the matter. And there's also her pay to play while Secretary of State and the Clinton Foundation that deserve investigation. Mrs. Clinton's serial corruption is unique in American political life.

I acknowledge that in a way, this may be grandstanding on Trump's part because Obama would undoubtedly give Hillary a presidential pardon if Trump wins. But it needed to be said to underline for the American people exactly who Hillary Clinton is and what her record of 'public service' consists of.

A better term might be 'public servicing.'

Speaking of which, here's a CNN reporter caught on video coaching and steering their focus group:




The redoubtable Spengler sees Trump as winning what he calls the National Battle for Legitimacy:

The referee should have stopped it in the tenth. Punching at will, Donald Trump said, "Hillary used the power of her office to make $250 million. Why not put some money in? You made a lot of it while you were secretary of State? Why aren't you putting money into your own campaign? Just curious." Reeling and against the ropes, Clinton gasped that she supported ... the Second Amendment. It was a brilliant rhetorical device: under the rubric of campaign financing, Trump slipped in an allegation that Clinton corruptly enriched herself by using the power of her office for personal gain--and Clinton didn't even respond. That's a win by a knockout.

That's the decisive issue of the campaign: the corrupt machinations of a ruling elite that considers itself above the law, and the rage of the American people against the oligarchical ruling class that has pulled the ladder up behind it. Trump's bombshell below Clinton's waterline came at the end of the debate, well prepared by jabs at Clinton's erased emails and Bill's rapes. Trump used the "J" word--that is, jail. That was perhaps the evening's most important moment. This is not an election fought over competing policies but a struggle for legitimacy. A very large portion of the electorate (how large a portion we will discover next month) believes that its government is no longer legitimate, and that it has become the instrument of an entrenched rent-seeking oligarchy.

Here's the moment Spengler is talking about. Note the crowd reaction. Trump came up with a perfect encapsulation of Hillary Clinton's corruption in one terse sentence. All but the true believers know she should be wearing an orange jumpsuit right now:



John Hindraker over at Powerline, no Trump fan, saw it this way:

Some of the rats might want to consider returning to the ship. Donald Trump came through pretty well tonight, mainly because the focus was on the issues. As long as issues are being discussed, Trump wins.

The moderators came out of the box with questions about Trump’s 2005 video, which many people expected to be the centerpiece of tonight’s debate. The effort flopped, I thought. Bill and Hillary Clinton took appropriate shots. After ten or fifteen minutes the conversation moved on to the issues.

Thereafter, the moderators tried to help Hillary, and Trump appropriately complained a couple of times. But he got his licks in. As always, he was sometimes incoherent, but more often than not, he made more sense than Hillary, who was in full Nurse Ratched mode.

Happily, immigration figured prominently. Shockingly, in the first debate the moderator never mentioned the topic. Tonight, it was discussed extensively. That is a big plus for Trump. The exchanges on foreign policy were inconclusive, of course, but in general I think Trump did better. And there was even talk about Obamacare, which is great for Trump and Republicans. [...}

In short, Trump won. In my opinion, he won big. We will see whether it matters.

Is this something of a biased roundup? Well, maybe. But no more biased than what's going on at CNN,The WAPO, Memeorandum or Real Clear Politics right now. One thing I did do was to quote people who are admittedly not Trump fans but who seemed to have changed their minds after last night. And annihilate one of today's common talking points by the Clinton media, an outright lie about Trump saying he'd put Hillary in jail if he wins.

Selah.

Roundup OnThe New 'Cromnibus' Spending Bill...'

The new 'Cromibus' spending bill passed the House yesterday and went to the Democrat dominated Senate. It essentially funds everything through September of 2015, even Michelle Obama's lunch program.

This essentially is an attempt to undercut the incoming GOP congress by removing its main weapon..the power of the purse.

The sole exception is the Department of Homeland Security which is funded until Feb. 27, 2015. That's a bone thrown at GOP conservatives to give the new congress something to work with to try and fight the president amnesty by executive diktat.Expect Boehner and his cronies to fight any attempts to rein in President Obama's amnesty order tooth and nail.

Sarah Palin:It stinks to high heaven. Did arrogant politicians not get the memo that Obama’s agenda was decisively defeated in last month’s historic midterm landslide? Good Lord, America said loud and clear not just “no” but “hell no” to Obama’s failed policies. Americans who pay attention said absolutely no to Obama’s amnesty for illegal aliens.

We also said no to the mother-of-all unfunded mandates, Obamacare, and voters believed promises that they would ratchet down the $18 trillion debt. Well, our bad for apathetically trusting politicians. No, on second thought, it’s not “our bad.” Some of us warned and worked hard to elect candidates who would buck the status quo. Many conscientious Americans did all they could to open the eyes of low-information voters. It was tough going up against Obama’s lapdogs in the media and the power liberals have to play their politics of personal destruction against commonsense conservatives.

But really how out-of-touch do these politicians have to be to misunderstand our recent mandate to stop Barack Obama's fundamental transformation of the greatest nation on earth?

The Republican Leadership in the House just flipped American voters the bird by sidelining the new Congress we just elected.

GOP Rep: House Leaders Made False Promise to Get My Crucial Vote :Representative Marlin Stutzman (R., Ind.) accused House Republican leadership of reneging on a deal made with him to get his support on a crucial procedural vote that almost killed the $1.1 trillion cromnibus funding bill.

“I was very surprised and even more disappointed to see the cromnibus back on the floor,” Stutzman said in a Thursday evening statement. “The American people deserve better.” [...]

“I supported the rule because I was informed by leadership that the cromnibus was dead and a short term CR would take its place,” Stutzman said.

After President Obama came out in favor of the funding bill, Republican leaders spent the day whipping their members and hoping that Democrats would deliver the requisite number of votes.

“The cromnibus bill, over 1,600 pages long, does many things but what is most important is what it does not do,” he said. “It fails to directly address President Obama’s dangerous executive action on immigration and fails to include many of the solutions that could have been passed in January with a Republican House and Senate in an open process.”

Dave Brat (R-VA) in a statement:“I had two opportunities to try to prevent the omnibus bill from becoming law, and I exercised both of them. Regardless of the many policy disagreements I had with the bill, this vote ultimately wasn’t about policy for me. This bill funds an illegal act. Above all, this vote was about following the law and the Constitution.

“Without the amendment that my House colleagues and I proposed yesterday, this omnibus bill allows funding for President Obama’s unconstitutional executive amnesty for approximately five million illegal immigrants.

“Despite having claimed several times that he didn’t have the authority to enact amnesty without Congress, President Obama acted anyway. Under our Constitution, the president can’t create the law; the president has to follow the law.

“I cannot vote to allow an agency of this government to commit an act that the president and the House leadership on both sides have previously agreed is illegal. Allowing the funding of executive amnesty, even just until the end of February, allows the program to be implemented and amnesty to be enacted.”


John Hayward, Human Events: Anyone who raises the slightest objection to this panicky spending bonanza is denounced as a penny-pinching extremist monster who just wants to kill children, puppies, and kittens for fun, by shutting down the government that keeps them alive. You don’t want Obama to throw up barricades around your national parks and memorials again, do you? No? Then shut up and spend.

The sole reservation in the winder spending festival is the Department of Homeland Security – which, as Fox News explains, is only funded through February, so the GOP leadership can pretend it’s going to stage a huge fight over Obama’s illegal amnesty orders next year. This is supposed to mollify the starchy citizens who still care about antiquated notions like the rule of law, the separation of powers, the value of citizenship, and national security long enough for the Establishment to enjoy its holiday vacation:

The bill finances the day-to-day operations of every Cabinet department except Homeland Security through Sept. 30, 2015, with $521 billion for defense and $492 billion tied to non-defense. Another $64 billion is provided for overseas military operations.

However, the plan would only fund the Department of Homeland Security through Feb. 27, 2015. That is a move by House GOP leaders to tee up a debate in early 2015 over the president’s recent executive action that could suspend deportation for as many as 5 million illegal immigrants.

Some conservatives nevertheless want to wage that battle now, and use the current spending bill as leverage. Though the House voted last week against Obama’s immigration plan, these lawmakers want to do more.

Strong opposition to the House budget plan from the Republicans’ conservative wing could force GOP chamber leaders to rely on Democratic votes to avert a government shutdown. House Speaker John Boehner can afford to lose only 17 caucus votes before he must turn to support from House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi.

Pelosi, D-Calif., has said her party would be willing to help but has signaled she may make some demands.

Wonderful. Let’s have a big round of applause for the GOP Establishment, ladies and gentlemen! They managed to throw away the most remarkable electoral victory in a generation in only one month, maneuvering themselves into a position where the losers who got crushed will be making demands to win their support for a bill that effectively ratifies their will through half of their sojourn in electoral exile.

There was no reason to give the defeated Democrats anything except a stop-gap bill to fund the government through January, at which point the incoming Republican majorities should have exercised control over everything. If the Democrats don’t like that deal, let them shut down the government in a fit of pique, and tell voters how they party they just threw out of power should be allowed to control their lives for an extra year. Not only would that be smart politics – giving the Republicans more fiscal leverage to stand up for America against Obama’s amnesty, instead of just funding for the Department of Homeland Security – but it would represent more sensible and responsible government. All of this multi-trillion-dollar monstrosity is linked together; all of it should be on the table; the flab should be liposuctioned out of every agency at once in a comprehensive plan for fiscal sanity and increased American liberty.

Drew At Ace of Spades HQ: What we should be focusing on is that the establishment of the GOP was far more interested in cutting deals with the Democrats than they were in exercising the power of their new majorities come January.

Look at the provisions that the GOP included in CrOmnibus that set off the Democratic progressives and some TEA types...

First was an increase the limits donors can give to political parties.

The provision would increase the amount of money a single donor could give to national party committees each year from $97,200 to as much as $777,600 by allowing them to set up different funds for certain expenses. The change would be a huge boost for party committees that have faced steep challenges in recent years from well-funded outside groups.

...

“Conservatives support the First Amendment and believe there should be no limits on political speech,” said Ken Cuccinelli, president of the Senate Conservatives Fund. “Unfortunately, the new limits included in the omnibus only increase political speech for party insiders while silencing the majority of Americans who are fed up with Washington.”

The second was a 'reform" of Dodd-Frank. Republicans have been running against Dodd-Frank for years. Normally their critique is that it hurts small businesses that can't afford to comply with a maze of regulations. The reform the GOP stood fast on? A provision literally written by Citigroup.

The derivatives provision would let JPMorgan, Citigroup Inc. (C:US), Bank of America Corp. (BAC:US) and other banks trade almost all swaps in divisions that have government backstops like deposit insurance. It would repeal a requirement that some of the trades be pushed out to separate units, which Wall Street argued would drive up costs for clients and increase risk in the financial system by moving the trades to firms less regulated than banks.

So thanks to the brave leadership of John Boehner, Harry Reid and Barack Obama we made it easier for political parties to fend off outside interest groups and make sure banks can trade derivatives again with the knowledge that if things go south, the taxpayers will foot the bill. The chairman of Citigroup certainly must be pleased with his personal lobbying efforts.

I'm not one to say there's no difference between the GOP and Democrats, that's silly. But it's not nearly enough or as much as they like to pretend.

The story isn't that a minority of the GOP found common cause with some Democrats to oppose these deals, it's that after facing a populist backlash after the failed GOP administration of 2001-2007, the party has successfully weathered the storm and returned to business as usual. Big donors and big business get theirs. Meanwhile voters who thought they voted for spending cuts and opposition to amnesty just six weeks or so ago are told, sorry can't do it. Good luck ever collecting.

Rush Limbaugh: The news is that the Republican Speaker of the House has thrown in with Barack Obama. I don't care what the Democrats are doing. What does that matter? Holy smokes. John Boehner has just squandered the election results before the Republicans even are sworn in to run the Senate, along with the House, if I've got this right.

Yeah, we're supposed to look the other way while our Speaker of the House gets in bed with Obama and advances the Obama agenda, takes care of it, amnesty, Obamacare, fully funded, done deal. The election must not have mattered.

And then we got Elizabeth Warren out there who's staking her claim to the presidency while Mrs. Clinton isn't looking. To show you how out of whack things are, Elizabeth Warren of, "You didn't build that. You didn't make that happen" fame, well known communist socialist Elizabeth Warren is now being credited as practically the only person in Washington standing up for the little guy via her opposition to some of the relaxation of regulations in Dodd-Frank and some of the campaign finance.  By the way, about that campaign finance stuff, that everybody's upset about in the omnibus bill, I'm gonna tell you exactly what that is. 

We had a caller about it yesterday. The lady was fit to be tied. She was angry and she was right to be, because the limits have practically been obliterated, which means that corporate donors can just start giving left and right. It used to be a limit of $37,000. Now it's $737,000, something.  It's incredible.  But the point of it, do you know why it's in there?  You know why?  The Republicans put it in.  You know why it's in there, folks?  This is how corporate America's gonna defeat the Tea Party.  By allowing limitless donations from that crowd under the rubric that it's campaign finance and money is speech and freedom of speech and First Amendment. The theory is that Main Street, Tea Party people can't come close to competing with corporate money. 

So it is a Republican establishment ploy that kind of dovetails nicely with Obama sicking the IRS on the Tea Party to basically eliminate them as a viable threat by relaxing a registration in Dodd-Frank that pretty much permits corporations to spend any kind of money they want on politics.  It's kind of a dichotomy.  It's a dilemma, in terms of figuring out what to think about it. 

Let me tell you about a congressman named Marlin Stutzman.  Marlin Stutzman is a Republican from Indiana, and he is claiming, he's put out a press release on this now.  He's admitting to this publicly. He's not relying on a publication to say it, he's saying it himself that he was lied to; that he was lied to by the Republican leadership; that the Republican leadership reneged on a deal they made with him to get his support for the omnibus bill.  Want the details?  He said, "I was very surprised and even more disappointed to see the cromnibus back on the floor. The American people deserve better."

 Elizabeth Warren, is, for all intents and purposes, threatening to shut down the government.  Now, where this thing is in the Senate's kind of up in the air, but she's threatening to shut down the government.  And the media is praising her.  The media is praising her for principled opposition.  And, as you know, Republican shutdown, why, it's the end of the world, it's the end of everything as we know it.  [...]

 The media is reporting this as, for all intents and purposes, a done deal.  They are reporting that all the action was in the House, and once the House voted for the $1.1 trillion omnibus, since the Democrats run the Senate it's a fait accompli that it's gonna get done.

That's not the case because there's a flamethrower over there named Elizabeth Warren, and she's not happy with what's in the Republican bill -- and neither, for that matter, is Nancy Pelosi.  So the Senate's not done on this.  They did a couple-of-days spending bill, and the Senate's gonna take its time and still argue about it, debate this.  Now, the consensus is that the Senate will ultimately pass it, because that's what Obama wants, and the Democrat Party's still loyal to him

But that's not a fait accompli.[...]

President Obama and John Boehner want a bill that the bases of their respective parties reject.  Boehner is enabling (or did enable) the passage of a bill in the House that the Republican base wants no part of.  They don't want Obamacare fully implemented or funded, and they do not want Obama to get away with this executive amnesty.  Boehner has worked with Obama

And the Republican version of the bill in the House flies in the face of what both the Democrat base and the Republican base want.  The Democrat base doesn't like the relaxation of regulations in Dodd-Frank, which is campaign finance, basically. There's some things the unions don't like about pensions as well, because their pensions are gonna end up being devalued.

There are a couple other things in it that the Democrat base is not happy about.  Another thing being reported is that Elizabeth Warren is taking a stand on an issue that, if successful, would embarrass Obama.  This is being reported.  This is not my opinion.  You can find this story somewhere in the Drive-By Media stash today. The stand that she is taking on the issue is a very populist stand.  It is a stance against Wall Street. 

Wall Street has been given a great gift in the omnibus spending bill: Relaxation of regulations on Dodd-Frank.  Opposing Wall Street... Remember Occupy Wall Street?  Opposing Wall Street is a huge ticket item for Elizabeth Warren, particularly if she wants to run for president.  The presumptive nominee, of course, is Mrs. Clinton.  We're right back where we were 2007 and 2008 with the Washington establishment of both parties concluding that Hillary Clinton will be the nominee.

We've been there. 

We've done that. 

And out of the blue, in 2007, came Barack Hussein Obama.  Out of the blue this year is coming Elizabeth Warren, and she's got a ready-made entry and a ready-made ticket with her populist opposition to the Wall Street favors that are in the omnibus bill.  Obama is in favor of relaxing those regulations on Wall Street because Obama is in bed with Wall Street and has been from the get-go, but his base is not really aware of that. 

The Democrat Party base has been driven insane with hatred for Wall Street. They've been driven insane with hatred for the US military. They've been driven insane with hatred for the CIA.  The Democrat Party base has been driven insane by the radical nature of what everybody thinks are mainstream Democrats.  Obama is as closely tied and in bed with Wall Street as anybody is, and Elizabeth Warren is not.

And she is distancing herself from the Democrats and particularly from Obama in a major way by taking a stand on that issue regarding Dodd-Frank.  If this bill goes down to smithereens because of this, it would be an embarrassment to Obama.  Again, this is what's being reported.  It is also being reported that Barack Obama is being abandoned by Democrats by the score on this because the Democrats are not happy with a couple of provisions. 

See, the Democrats are not invested in Obamacare to the degree that you would believe.  Remember, Obamacare is why they lost, in their minds -- and you've heard by now the old stat that half the Democrat senators remaining in the Senate who voted for Obamacare, for one reason or another, are gone.  We've had Chuck-U Schumer and Tom Harkin and a number of other Democrats publicly throw Obamacare under the bus claiming it was bad bill.

(summarized) "It was a mistake timing-wise. We shouldn't have done it before we shored up the economy." There are Democrats running away from Obamacare.  It's John Boehner who's in bed with Obama on Obamacare, not the Democrats.  And one of the things we're supposed to be taking great satisfaction from watching is the Democrat fallout over Obamacare. 

But Boehner has picked up the slack there with the Republican omnibus bill, which fully funds it.  So now the Democrats are free to walk away from it, which they wanted to do and have.  So when you see it reported that Democrats are abandoning Obama by the score, one of the things they're abandoning him on is Obamacare.  Look, they have lost big in the last two midterm elections.

This is still... The scope of this defeat is still not accurately reported in the Drive-By Media, although if you keep your radio tuned to this station, you will soon hear that the Washington Post has a story today which fulfills a prophecy of mine back in 2008, 2009. I wasn't the only one, but I might have led the pack on this, as referring to Barack Obama's presidency as Jimmy Carter's second term. 

Today's Washington Post pretty much says that, and they do it with polling data.  They do it on the basis that there is a nationwide malaise among the American people, that they are despondent and depressed and feeling hopeless. There's no opportunity for the American dream. There's no opportunity for economic advancement.  It's not a pretty picture, and it's being painted in the Washington Post.  Jimmy Carter's second term. 

Lisa Lerer, Bloomberg: On one side of the debate are strategists and officials, including some aligned with Clinton, who believe their path to the White House in the post-Obama era rests with wooing centrist, working class voters.  To progressive activists, union members, and other parts of the "professional left," as an Obama aide once called them, victory lies in running on an aggressive, populist economic message.

"Some of the jockeying now is trying to strategically make sure Hillary understands that she can't be an economic moderate without generating pushback," said Andy Stern, the former head of the Service Employees International Union. "Progressives are anxious that her policies, not her heart, will be too generous toward Wall Street."

 With the Senate soon to be in Republican control, progressives aspire to become their own power center that can force Democrats to stand strong on economic issues. By aligning themselves with Warren, who’s an outspoken advocate of Wall Street regulation, groups like MoveOn not only grow membership lists and bank accounts, they also raise their profile.

While Warren is their billboard, the real target is likely Clinton. A history of pro-business economic policies and a roster of rich Wall Street donors make progressive and union activists anxious about the direction of her leadership and political loyalties. Though she has yet to announce a campaign, they're trying to send the message that their concerns should not be taken for granted.  "I think the fact that people are encouraging a person who probably isn't going to run may just be a manifestation of wanting to make clear that Secretary Clinton is not going to walk in and assume there's a coronation," said Stern. "She's going to have to work it policy-wise, particularly on the economy"

The Hill- Warren Makes Her Mark:Sen. Elizabeth Warren’s crusade against the $1.1 trillion spending bill backed by the White House firmly establishes the Massachusetts populist as a powerful player in Washington.

The freshman Democrat took on President Obama and her party’s leadership, and appeared to inspire an uprising in the House.

The fight earned her comparisons to Texas firebrand Republican Sen. Ted Cruz, another relative newcomer to the Senate who has shown outsized clout in his party.  

Warren lost the battle in the House when the spending bill was approved in a late-night 219-206 vote, and the fight is now moving to Warren’s turf in the Senate.

If she continues to fight hard against the bill, it will pull her into a deeper clash with Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D-Nev.), who backed the spending deal and has just named Warren to his leadership team.

 “I have to assume Elizabeth Warren is running for president. That’s what you do when you run for president. You get out front,” said Rep. Jim Moran (D-Va.), a senior member of the House Appropriations Committee who backed the spending bill opposed by Warren.

Government Shutdown And ObamaCare Roundup

It's the first official day of the government shutdown and of ObamaCare's rollout..here are some worthy reads on the matter:

The Other McCain: Fear And Loathing In Moocher Nation:"People who don’t currently have health insurance are likely to believe that ObamaCare will “help” them, if they think of it as a something-for-nothing giveaway — “Free Stuff!” — but as P.J. O’Rourke once observed about rent-control policies, the problem with something-for-nothing is that you quickly run out of something and end up with a whole lot of nothing. Demand for anything worth having will inevitably exceed the supply, and this is why we have prices. Attempts to evade the market mechanism of prices, whether through mandates or subsidies or some other government regulatory apparatus, tend to produce market distortions and shortages.

Federal and state governments have been interfering with the market mechanisms of the medical industry and health insurance for decades, and have “succeeded” in the way such interventions usually do, by making everything more complicated, and more expensive for everybody except for those who get health care “free.” Of course, someone must pay for “free” health care, and the transfer of this cost from the recipient of treatment to taxpayers has consequences.

If people need “free” health care because they are able-bodied but unemployed, wouldn’t we have more jobs and better jobs if the economy were prosperous and growing? And if we had lower taxes and fewer regulations, wouldn’t the economy be more healthy?

Furthermore, wouldn’t the economy be stronger overall — wouldn’t there be more demand for goods and services — if people had more incentive to work harder, work more efficiently and work longer hours, in order to make themselves so valuable as workers that employers would compete to hire them, offering health-insurance benefits as a bonus to secure their services? Yet if we establish a system where people receive health insurance whether they are working or unemployed, whether they are efficient and diligent or unproductive and slothful, haven’t we thereby removed a basic incentive to hard work? And, when you think about it, haven’t we removed an incentive to good health?

Have another donut, fatso! Don’t worry about the consequences, because the government will pick up the tab for your heart medicine, your diabetes treatments and therapy for your bad knees.

Also, they’ll pay for your Viagra, because fat guys need love, too."

PJ Media Despite Three-and-a-Half Years to Prep Obamacare, A Fiasco Takes Shape: "The facts, whatever the PR turns out to be, are that the administration and the press have failed Obamacare tests for three-and-a-half years. Admittedly, they have had assistance from the law’s opponents, who have inexplicably failed to highlight easily understood and financially crippling design flaws which — if conveyed to the public — would have caused the program’s meager popularity to crater.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has had since March 2010 to prepare for open enrollment’s October 2013 rollout. Besides churning out thousands of pages of regulations, what have she and her army been doing?

Someone performing as Sebelius has in the private sector would have been fired at least a year ago, when it become obvious that her implementation plan — having already missed critical deadlines almost two years ago – was still hopelessly behind."

Edward Isaac Dovere and Reid J. Epstein/Politico Government shutdown: President Obama holds the line: "President Barack Obama started September in an agonizing, extended display of how little sway he had in Congress. He ended the month with a display of resolve and strength that could redefine his presidency.

All it took was a government shutdown.

This was less a White House strategy than simply staying in the corner the House GOP had painted them into — to the White House’s surprise, Obama was forced to do what he so rarely has as president: he said no, and he didn’t stop saying no."

Nick Gillespie Welcome to the Age of Unlimited Government! :"It’s a telling coincidence that the latest scandalous revelation about the National Security Agency (NSA) is hitting the front pages just as the enrollment period specified by the Affordable Care Act (ACA, a.k.a. Obamacare) is getting started.

Each of these things underscores different but related aspects of the virtually unlimited state that has ruined the peaceful slumber of libertarian-minded Americans for decades. Whether we’re talking about surveilling citizens without any sort of serious legal oversight or forcing them to participate in economic activity in the name of health care über alles, the answer always seems to favor the growth and power of the state to control more and more aspects of our lives. Is it any wonder that a record-high percentage of Americans think the federal government is too powerful?"

Dana MilBank, WAPO In Congress, a not-so-brief case of delusion over government shutdown : "I almost shut down the government.

As I waited outside a meeting of the House Republican caucus in the Capitol basement Monday afternoon, I put down my briefcase next to a flowerpot and walked around the corner to catch lawmakers as they exited. Minutes later, an aide to Majority Leader Eric Cantor (R-Va.) came bounding down the hall toward me, calling out, “Is that your bag?”

The Capitol police had identified it as a suspicious package and isolated it. Had I not claimed the briefcase, they may well have evacuated the Republicans from their strategy session — and I would have been responsible for them failing to come up with a final plan to avert the shutdown.

As it turns out, the Republicans didn’t need help from me to blow things up."

Michelle Malkin Obama Lied, My Health Plan Died : "Like an estimated 22 million other Americans, I am a self-employed small-business owner who buys health insurance for my family directly on the individual market. We have a high-deductible PPO plan that allows us to choose from a wide range of doctors.

Or rather, we had such a plan.

Last week, our family received notice from Anthem BlueCross BlueShield of Colorado that we can no longer keep the plan we like because of “changes from health care reform (also called the Affordable Care Act or ACA).” The letter informed us that “(t)o meet the requirements of the new laws, your current plan can no longer be continued beyond your 2014 renewal date.”

In short: Obama lied. My health plan died."

Sean Trende The Politics of the Government Shutdown : "With the government having lurched into its first shutdown since the 1990s, many commentators are focusing on the potential ill effects that it might have for Republicans. Almost all of these analyses use the shutdowns of 1995-1996 as their starting point. While I don't think this development will be great for Republicans, many of the concerns are likely overwrought. Here are four points to ponder:

1. While the GOP’s tactics are similar to those employed in the mid-’90s, the goals are different. The earlier budget debates were broad in nature and dealt with the scope of government. The 104th Congress, led by Newt Gingrich, believed that they were the culmination of the realignment supposedly begun by Ronald Reagan, that Bill Clinton’s election was a fluke caused by Ross Perot’s candidacy, and that they had been elected with a mandate to shrink the size and scope of government dramatically."

Jay Cost/Weekly Standard Roll It Back: "Obamacare remains decisively unpopular with the American people, and most Republicans are staunchly committed to its repeal. And why shouldn’t they be? The ideological core of the bill runs contrary to the vision of limited government, market-based solutions, and individual choice that has formed the foundation of the party’s economic program since the statism of the First New Deal. Moreover, the party’s purpose is to win elections, and Obamacare still looks like a winning issue for the GOP.

Against the airtight ideological and political arguments for Republican repeal efforts, Democrats and their liberal allies in the mainstream media have resorted to variations on a single theme: Opposition violates our sacrosanct political traditions. The Supreme Court upheld (most of) Obamacare; the president won reelection; ergo, continued efforts to undo the health law, especially those to defund it, are in grossly poor form. As Harry Reid so gracefully tweeted last week: “We will not bow to Tea Party anarchists who deny the mere fact that Obamacare is the law.” According to Reid, the effort to defund this particular law is tantamount to opposition to the concept of law itself.

The position that leftists have adopted here is absurd, for two reasons. First, the notion that Obama’s reelection in 2012 was a plebiscite on the relative merits of Obamacare is wishful thinking. American elections are rarely, if ever, plebiscites. Politicians work to make elections about a whole host of things; more often than not, electoral campaigns scrupulously avoid the big issues of the day. It is much better, from the politicians’ perspective, to turn the election into a contest of personalities or valence issues, those on which the public concurs."

Just FYI - GOP Debate Roundup

The GOP debate got a great deal of attention from some interesting sources. At lot of pundits seem to agree with my take that the big winners were Michele Bachmann and Mitt Romney, both of whom definitely looked presidential.

Mark Steyn weighs in and makes comic fodder of CNN's hapless John King and some of the circumlocution on foreign policy issues, but hearts Michele Bachmann and includes a link to his fave photo of her, with hopes it doesn't ruin her campaign.

Nate Silver over at his New York Times 538 blog sees the door opening for Texas Governor Rick Perry and closing for Governor Sarah Palin, while the WAPO's Dana Milbank saw Michele Bachman as stealing last night's show. In fact, it appears that a lot of people were pleasantly surprised by Michele Bachman's performance, ( the NRO's poll showed 41% calling Bachmann the winner, as opposed to a mere 20% who thought Mitt Romney did) which means the Left wing attack machine probably got its marching orders from the White House today to dig for dirt on Rep. Bachmann. Even The Washington Post’s Ezra Klein, a True Obama Believer tweeted: “Romney’s polish was perhaps to be expected. But Bachmann is much newer to politics than much of the field. Her ease is impressive.' Ummm, Ezra, it comes from knowing what you're talking about. As opposed to reading from a teleprompter.

Michael Barone sees no clear frontrunner, but sees both Bachmann and Romney strengthened by their debate performance, and Pawlenty weakened. Steve Kornacki, Salon's news editor and obviously no Republican nevertheless described Michele Bachman's performance as 'something of a revelation.'

Bill Kristol over at The Weekly Standard asks an interesting question - which potential candidates who weren't present last night were helped or hurt by last night's debate?

And of course, there's VodkaPundit's live Drunkblogging....sample line - "How do you tell the difference between CNN and MSNBC? One makes you wish it made you laugh."

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The 'Hate' Roundup

I shouldn't, but I still find it difficult to believe how the Left is soiling itself trying to make political capital out of the Tucson shootings. A few of the better offerings:

Ann Coulter writes brilliantly as always about how the the Left seeks a ban on metaphors in the wake of the Arizona shootings:

After the monstrous shooting in Arizona last week, surely we can all agree that we've got to pass Obama's agenda immediately and stop using metaphors.

At least I think that's what the mainstream media are trying to tell me.

Liberals instantly leapt on the sickening massacre at a Tucson political event over the weekend to accuse tea partiers, Sarah Palin and all conservatives who talk out loud of being complicit in murder by inspiring the shooter, Jared Loughner.

Of course, to make their case, they first must demonstrate:

(a) Right-wingers have called for violence against anyone, especially conservative, pro-Second Amendment Democratic congresswomen;

(b) Loughner was listening to them; and

(c) Loughner was influenced by them.

They've proved none of this. In fact, it's nearly the opposite.

Blogpal Hube takes this to the ultimate level of absurdity by reproducing a 'Map of Hate':



Look at the skulls..including one directly on(GASP!) Tucson! Oh wait these are just cities that hold a Dia Del Muerto ( Day of the Dead)fiesta, the Mexican Hallow'een!

Ann Althouse points out that this is a time-honored Leftist tactic, and provides a superb list of tragedies the Laft has tried to make political capital out of, while the WSJ's James Taranto points out that NYT loonPaul Krugman's screeds against the Right and Michelle Bachman are not only unhinged but downright falsehoods.

Rush Limbaugh spent some air time today pointing out how the dinosaur media deliberately excised or minimized information from Loughner's best friend that he never watched TV, disliked the news and never listened to political talk shows. As theinimitable El Rushbo put it, the truth is the first casualty.

Sarah Palin had a superb facebook post and video I posted on earlier, and among other things she quite appropriately used the term 'blood libel' to describe what the media was doing to her and other voices on the right.
Needless to say, several left leaning Jewish groups tied to the Democrats attacked her for using the term, and no less than Alan Dershowitz came out defending her for it.

In fact, Charles Krauthammer in the NRO, no Palinfan, referred to what's going on as massacre, followed by libel.

I'll repeat what I said earlier: As a Jew, I think her use of the term 'blood libel' was entirely appropriate, since it refers to false and libelous accusations leveled because of whom one is rather than anything they've actually done.

Sarah Palin may not be Jewish, but I would definitely say that based on how she's been treated since she became part of the national scene, she's an honorary member of the Tribe, the 'Jew' of American politics.

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Roundup On The Arizona Shooting

Christina Green, 9/11/01 - 1/08/11...RIP


It appears that my disgusted reaction to the way the Left is exploiting the tragic Arizona shootings was shared by a number of other observers.

Howard Kurz, of all people defends Sarah Palin and is frank about saying: "This isn't about a nearly year-old Sarah Palin map; it's about a lone nutjob who doesn't value human life."

He scolds the Left, saying: "It would be nice if we briefly put aside partisan differences and came together with sympathy and support for Gabby Giffords and the other victims, rather than opening rhetorical fire ourselves."

Blogpal Professor William Jacobson over at Le·gal In·sur·rec·tion cites two sicknesses on display - the sickness living inside gunman Jared Loughner's head and "the swiftness and the vigor with which the left-wing blogosphere and some more mainstream Democrats immediately sought to blame Sarah Palin and right-wing "vitriol" in general for the shooting."

Pam over at Atlas Shrugs points out the obscene hypocrisy of Angry Lefties like Markos at Daily Kos accusing anyone of violent rhetoric, using a screen shot of a post on Giffords the Commandante of Kos quickly scrubbed and sent down the memory hole.

Dana Loesch over at Big Journalism likewise has a superb piece on how the Left is, vampire-like, exploiting this tragedy for political ends. She fisks a particularly egregious interview given by Far Left Congressman Raul Grijalva to Mother Jones, and astutely reminds us that anyone who remembers how the Paul Wellstone memorial service was used by the Left shouldn't be surprised.

And speaking of matters Breitbart, Andrew is delving to the heart of the matter as usual by simply retweeting the screeds the Left is throwing his way. Money quote: "I miss the 60s - when lefties at least pretended to be lovable peaceful hippies."

Jim Hoft over at Gateway Pundit is all over this story, pointing out that the dinosaur media interviewed one Loughner's friends without reporting on her claims that Loughner was"Left-wing" and "quite Liberal". Jim also points out that a Democrat operative admitted to the Politico that there was an active plan to blame the Tea Party for the carnage.

Greg over at Rhymes With Right takes the entire Leftist meme to the point of absurdity, while Deborah over at Right Truth has a useful rundown of the facts surrounding the shooting.

Don't be surprised to get Democrat fund raisers in the mail using this...they will.

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