Well done, and in convenient video form. Put together by the folks at Minnesota Majority, based on original work by the folks at Ace of Spades.
Posts Tagged ‘Obama’
Obama by the Numbers
Tuesday, October 4th, 2011“Greece is not salvagable”
Friday, September 30th, 2011That’s the rather bracing judgment from this Stratfor overview of Greece’s problem. Moreover, they’re saying that about its existence as a nation-state, even absent the European debt crises. Also: “Greece has to be kicked out of the Eurozone if the Eurozone is to survive.” Problem? They don’t have enough “firebreak” funds to do it. “Until the Europeans have 2 trillion Euro in funding stashed away, they can’t kick Greece out of the system.”
I’m not sure I share the pessimism about Greece in the long run. After all, nation-states can exist for an awful long time, despite crappy conditions (see, for example, Haiti). Of course, that assumes that a newly Islamic Turkey doesn’t decide to settle old scores by conquering them outright. (Assuming, of course, that Turkey is still predominately Turkish rather than Kurdish. Claire Berlinski is a little more sanguine about that prospect.)
Honestly, of the two, I think Greece will outlast the Eurozone by a good measure. The question isn’t the whether Eurocrats can prevent the Eurozone from breaking up, but rather how long they can delay the inevitable, how much sovereign debt can they put taxpayers on the hook for, and how much harder will the inevitable market correction be when it comes? It seems to be a race between how much European taxpayer money can be wasted propping up Europe’s bankrupt welfare states vs. how much of American taxpayer money can the Obama administration waste channeling payouts to well-connected Democratic cronies. The Eurocrats may be winning the race to insolvency, if only due to the lack of a European Tea Party.
In other Euro Debt Crises news:
Is there any other place desperate Eurocrats can get money to prop up their falling welfare states? Are they perhaps hoping that Obama will bail them out? After all, what’s a few more trillions in unsupported debt between friends?
LinkSwarm for September 27, 1011.
Tuesday, September 27th, 2011Some Analysis of the Republican Victory in the New York Ninth Congressional District Special Election
Thursday, September 15th, 2011I’m a sucker for wonkish political analysis of voting results, so here are some of the more notable results-scrying for Bob Turner’s win over David Weprin in New York’s Ninth Congressional District after Rep. Anthony “look at my bulge” Weiner resigned in disgrace. A race Weprin lost despite $485,000 of DCCC ad buys and having Bill Clinton and New York Governor Andrew Coumo campaign for him. I’m going to ignore the usual “weak candidate, ran a bad race” blather liberals always trot out when a Democrat loses, because it’s become a tautology that doesn’t explain anything. He lost? Bad candidate that ran a bad campaign. He won? A good candidate who ran a good campaign.
Speaking of incompetence, let’s also dismiss DNC chair Debbie Wasserman Schultz laughable assertion that a district where registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans 3-1 “is difficult for Democrats.” Even more risible is Wasserman Schultz’s claim that Obama has an “incredibly strong record on Israel.” She truly is the gift that keeps giving to Republicans.
So why did Weprin lose? Some theories:
Democratic strategist James Carville says it’s time for Obama to panic, but his advice is on the lines of firing people, find some scapegoats, and return to Ye Olde Big Government Religion. (He also seems to regard a $1.25 trillion budget deficit as “austerity.”) Walter Russell Mead isn’t impressed with the advice: “This President doesn’t do ‘tough’ very well….he isn’t convincing as a Chuck Norris impersonator. Often when he tries to sound tough he comes out tinny. Also, teleprompters don’t work when the goal is to project spontaneous, righteous and passionate rage.”
If NY9 is indeed a bellwether for 2012 (a big if), Democrats are in for some pretty rough storms over the next 14 months…
LinkSwarm for Friday, September 9, 2011
Friday, September 9th, 2011After an unusually active week, here’s a LinkSwarm for a lazy Friday, including a few things I meant to link to earlier and didn’t have the time.
Obama Jobs Speech Bingo
Thursday, September 8th, 2011Pity the pundit forced by duty to watch an Obama speech. Barring a Teleprompter malfunction, there are few events more tedious and predictable. When even uber-Democrat James Carville says that between an Obama speech and a Republican debate, “I would have watched the debate and I’m not even a Republican or even close to being a Republican,” you know you’re in store for some deep hurting.
So how can we assuage the agony of those poor, dedicated souls who will be watching Obama’s jobs speech tonight? Barring an announcement that he’s abandoning Big Government liberalism for budget and tax cuts, the chances for another Obama snoozefest are vast, while the possibility of anything new and substantive are slim. How can we keep their attention focused on the POTUS, and not on the desperate need for another highball or passing a sanity roll?
Simple: With my handy Obama Jobs Speech Bingo chart below! Just print out and place a marker every time Obama trots out one of his stock job speech phrases. Which I’m confident will be pretty darn often.
Which dedicated pundit will be the first to post “Bingo! #ObamaBingo” to Twitter tonight?
Click to embiggen
Edited to add: Welcome Powerline readers! As you can tell from the blogroll on the right, Powerline has long been one of my favorite blogs, so feel free to look around for news from the hot, dusty heart of Texas.
Correction: The Obama Administration Still Wants To Kill Texans
Monday, September 5th, 2011It appears that my celebration was premature. I previously reported that the Obama Administration’s shelving of new, economically-destructive smog regulations meant Texas was off the hook. It now appears that isn’t the case, and we can still expect rolling blackouts (and likely additional heat-related fatalities) thanks to the completely different “cross-state pollution rules:”
The controversial “cross-state pollution” rule, which aims at tightening emissions from power plants in Texas and 26 other states, remains scheduled for implementation in January. The cross-state rule targets nitrogen oxides, an ozone precursor, as well as sulfur dioxide, which is not an ozone precursor but can also cause lung damage.
“The cross state air pollution rule is final,” Betsaida Alcantara, press secretary for the Environmental Protection Agency, which crafted the rule, said in an email.
[snip]
The cross-state rule requires Texas power plants to lower sulfur dioxide emissions by 46 percent and nitrogen oxide emissions by 7 percent compared with 2009 levels, according to the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality (TCEQ), the state’s environmental agency.
But the cross-state rule has stirred huge opposition from Texas officials, who say it is onerous and takes effect too quickly. In a statement Friday, the TCEQ said that it hoped the ozone rule pullback “signals that the EPA is beginning to consider science and common sense in their decisions, and we would hope that they would apply this to other regulations such as the proposed cross-state air pollution rule.”
Last week the Texas electric grid operator reported that the cross-state rule could curtail the operations of some coal plants so severely that it could lead to rolling blackouts — an issue that carries heightened visibility as Texas comes off a scorching summer that badly stretched power supplies.
“At least two” rotating outages would have occurred this summer had the pollution rule been in place, said Warren Lasher, an official with the Electric Reliability Council of Texas, the grid operator.
So it appears that I was wrong when stating the EPA had come to its senses. In fact, he Obama Administration does still want to kill Texans in the name of radical environmentalism.
BattleSwarmBlog regrets the error.
Two Great Scandals that Taste Great Together
Sunday, September 4th, 2011You’ve heard about the Fast and Furious Gunwalker Scandal. And you’ve heard about the scandal involving the Obama Administration’s raid of Gibson Guitars. But it took Iowahawk to combine them.
EPA Shelves Smog Rules: Texas Off the Hook
Friday, September 2nd, 2011When last we checked the Obama Administration, as part of it’s ongoing war against (pick one or more) A) Energy, B.) Capitalism, and/or C.) Texas, had the EPA come up with new emissions rules that would have resulted in Texas power plants having to shutdown before sufficient new capacity was online, which would most likely have resulted in rolling blackouts (and probably fatalities) the next time summer came around.
Now comes word that the EPA is backing off on new smog emissions rules. Naturally Rick Perry, the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality, and the 25 million Texans who’s A/C won’t suddenly shut off when it hits 112° in August because some bureaucrat in Washington decreed it are pleased, while radical environmentalists are outraged.
Score one for the good guys.
Perry Tops Obama 44% to 41% in Latest Poll
Thursday, September 1st, 2011According to Rasmussen, “for the first time this year, Texas Governor Rick Perry leads President Obama in a national Election 2012 survey. Other Republican candidates trail the president by single digits.” That’s within the margin of error, but it’s still a striking result. Go back to November 4th of 2008 and tell victorious liberals that Obama would be tied in the polls with a conservative Texas governor and they would have looked at you like you had a rabid duck on your head.
Plenty of liberals had been hoping to see Rick Perry get the GOP nomination because they regarded him as (next to Bachmann and Palin) too conservative to win. Much like liberals thinking the same of Ronald Reagan in 1979, they may rue getting their wish…