Democratic DoubleSpeak Election Promises Falling Fast
Democratic Doublespeak
August 27, 2009
WALL STREET JOURNAL
The Pelosi-Obama Deficits
Even $9 trillion might be too optimistic on current spending trends.
August 26, 2009
Excerpts:
Earlier this year when President Obama was selling his first budget blueprint, he promised to end years of "borrow and spend" budgeting. Yesterday, reality struck.
Mr. Obama's White House and the Congressional Budget Office told us that current U.S. fiscal policy is "borrow and spend" on a hyperlink. The good news is the deficit for 2009 will be "only" $1.58 trillion, about $250 billion lower than expected thanks to less need for TARP funds. But the Obama fiscal plan envisions $9 trillion in new borrowing over the next decade, which is $2 trillion more debt than the White House predicted earlier this year. The 2010 deficit also rises by about as much as the 2009 deficit falls from January, so even the TARP windfall gets spent.[2deficits]
We've never fretted over budget deficits, at least if they finance tax cuts to promote growth or spending to win a war. But these deficit estimates are driven entirely by more domestic spending and already assume huge new tax increases. CBO predicts that debt held by the public as a share of GDP, which was 40.8% in 2008, will rise to 67.8% in 2019—and then keep climbing after that. CBO says this is "unsustainable," but even this forecast may be optimistic.
It's been a hilarious August, watching media supporters of President Obama's health care package puzzle over the obscure motivations of the noncompliant Americans rallying against it.
"Racial anxiety," guessed New York Times columnist Paul Krugman.
"Nihilism," theorized Time's Joe Klein.
"The crazy tree blooms in every moment of liberal ascendancy," historian Rick Perlstein proclaimed in the Washington Post.
While the commentariat's condescension is almost comical, the whole evil-or-stupid explanation misses the elephant in Obama's room: Americans of all stripes, it turns out, aren't very keen about the government barging into their lives.
DEMS Used Massachussetts Model For Guide. That Plan Now Rapidly Heading Downhill
CHICAGOTRIBUNE.COM
Got an aspirin?
July 21, 2009
House Democratic leaders trotted out their $1 trillion-plus health-care plan last week, including all sorts of ways they hope to control costs . . . much later.
But first, they say, all Americans must be covered by health insurance.
For inspiration, the Democrats borrowed heavily from Massachusetts' pioneering 2006 law, which did much the same thing: It mandated that everyone be covered, imposed fines on those who refused to buy insurance and offered subsidies for those who couldn't afford it.
Massachusetts also punted on any notion of taming health-care costs.
Stimulus: More grim news — 467,000 jobs lost in June, with unemployment hitting a 26-year high of 9.5%. Some people are rightly starting to wonder: Where's that stimulus we were promised?
Excerpts:
The stock market's reaction on Thursday said it all — with the major indexes plunging 2.4% to 2.9% on the news of a continued job hemorrhage. Despite some economic green shoots here and there, no one's sure when jobs will start growing again.
At this point in a normal downturn lasting 11 months, the economy should be booming — with big jumps in GDP and 300,000 new jobs each month coming mostly from the private sector.
But 18 months into this downturn, we're still losing jobs — with 2.7 million gone in the private sector just since January, when the Democrats took full control of the government.
President Barack Obama walked into the Oval Office with a veritable halo over his head. In the eyes of his backers, he could say or do no wrong because he had evidently descended directly from heaven to return celestial order to our fallen world. Oprah declared his tongue to be "dipped in the unvarnished truth." Newsweek editor Evan Thomas averred that Obama "stands above the country and above the world as a sort of a God."
But when it comes to health care reform, with every passing day, Obama seems less God and more demagogue, uttering not transcendental truths, but bald-faced lies. Here are the top five lies that His Awesomeness has told--the first two for no reason other than to get elected and the next three to sell socialized medicine to a wary nation.
Lie One: No one will be compelled to buy coverage.
During the campaign, Obama insisted that he would not resort to an individual mandate to achieve universal coverage. In fact, he repeatedly ripped Hillary Clinton's plan for proposing one. "To force people to buy coverage," he insisted, "you've got to have a very harsh penalty." What will this penalty be, he demanded? "Are you going to garnish their wages?" he asked Hillary in one debate.
Obama's EPA Quashes Climate Change Science June 28, 2009 Posted by John at 7:28 AM
John Hinderaker
Excerpts:
The Competitive Enterprise Institute has obtained an EPA study of the "endangerment" to human well-being ostensibly caused by carbon dioxide emissions, together with a set of EPA emails indicating that the study, which concludes that carbon dioxide is not a significant cause of climate change, was suppressed by the EPA for political reasons.
You can read the comments that the CEI submitted to the EPA on EPA's proposed endangerment finding here, along with the emails. The censored report, by Alan Carlin and John Davidson, is here.
In their report, Carlin and Davidson point out that the EPA has not done its own evaluation of the global warming theory. Rather, it has relied on analyses by others, mostly the U.N.'s IPCC (Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change) report. That report, however, was a political document, not a scientific one. Knowing that current scientific research disproves the anthropogenic global warming theory, the U.N. ordered that no recent research be considered in the IPCC report. This is a scandal of which too few people are aware. As science, the U.N. report is a bad joke.
The attorney general reveals his legal ignorance — or, his willful inconsistency.
By Andrew C. McCarthy
Excerpts:
There was a little noticed bombshell in Washington’s waterboarding melodrama last week. And it wasn’t Nancy Pelosi’s implosion in a Capitol Hill press room, where she yet again tried to explain her inexplicable failure to protest the CIA’s “torturing” of detainees. No, this one detonated in the hearing room of the House Judiciary Committee. There, Attorney General Eric Holder inadvertently destroyed the warped basis for his claim that waterboarding, as administered by the CIA, amounted to torture.
As originally reported by Connie Hair of Human Events, Holder’s undoing was the result of deft questioning by two committee Republicans: Dan Lungren, California’s former state attorney general, and Louie Gohmert, the former chief judge of a Texas appeals court. The two congressmen highlighted a fatal flaw in Holder’s theory. Moreover, they demonstrated that — despite having accused the CIA and the Bush administration of war crimes by cavalierly branding waterboarding as “torture” — the attorney general has still not acquainted himself with the legal elements of a torture offense, particularly the required mental state. This is remarkable, given that Holder’s own department explained these elements less than a month ago in a federal appeals court brief.
Rep. Lungren pointed out that if the attorney general truly believes “waterboarding is torture,” he must also think we torture our own Navy SEALs and other special-operations personnel when we waterboard them as part of their training. “No . . . not in the legal sense,” countered Holder. You see, said he, it’s “a fundamentally different thing,” because
It's obvious that either Leon Panetta, Obama's head of the CIA, or Nancy Pelosi, his party's Speaker of the House, has to go. No administration can tolerate a permanent, public civil war between two such high-ranking officials.
Especially when their disagreement stems not from issues of policy but from matters of veracity and credibility, the battle must end in one of their resignations. You cannot have the head of the nation's first line of defense against terrorism calling the Speaker of the House a liar and being attacked by her in turn.
Obviously, Obama cannot fire Panetta. First of all, he just appointed him. And second, to cave in to Pelosi (D-Calif.) would earn him the massive disrespect and disapproval of the very operatives on whom he must depend to keep the nation safe.
Democratic Doublespeak MAY 15, 2009
WALL STREET JOURNAL
By Jim DeMint
Excerpts:
On April 25, Sen. Ted Kennedy formally kicked off the great health-care debate of 2009 with an op-ed titled “My Call to Arms” in his hometown Boston Globe. In the article, he made the now-familiar case for government-guaranteed health insurance for all. But in an otherwise benign sentence, Kennedy let slip a troubling suggestion about the Democrats’ plans for a government takeover of health care.
Kennedy says the best way to guarantee universal access to quality care is “by giving Americans the option of enrolling in a public health-insurance plan, where coverage is provided in the public interest” (emphasis added). There’s only one problem: Health care isn’t public; it’s personal and private. It can’t be provided in the public interest for the simple reason that no doctor has ever cared for “the public.” Doctors care for patients. And health care, under any recognizable definition, can be provided only in the patient’s interest. Any law that empowers government to provide individual coverage in the public interest implicitly empowers government to deny individual coverage for the same reason.
Listening to President Obama, it is clear what he thinks the “public interest” in health care is: getting costs under control. During his economic speech at Georgetown University last month, Obama warned of the costs of our health-care system no fewer than ten times. During his address to a joint session of Congress in February, he mentioned the system’s costs eight times.
Nancy Pelosi has a tall tale regarding her purported ignorance of the enhanced interrogation techniques that President Obama and Pelosi's fellow Democrats condemn as "torture." Pelosi boldly denied she had been informed of the actual use of the techniques in the briefings she received as a ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee. Huck Finn would have called Pelosi's tale a "stretcher." Here is Pelosi's classic "stretcher" of April 23:
"In that or any other briefing...we were not, and I repeat, were not told that waterboarding or any of these other enhanced interrogation techniques were used. What they did tell us is that they had some legislative counsel...opinions that they could be used."
Pelosi's "stretcher" impelled former House Intelligence Committee chairman and CIA director Porter Goss to contradict her. Charles Krauthammer condemned Pelosi as "utterly contemptible." Now the intelligence community is having its own say. The Washington Post reports:
House Speaker Nancy Pelosi had been pushing for a "truth commission" to investigate the CIA's use of "enhanced interrogation" techniques like waterboarding -- until Republicans started shining the spotlight on Pelosi herself. Now she is not so adamant.
Spokesman Brendan Daly told me that Pelosi wants a truth commission, "but she still realizes the political reality" -- as in the opposition of President Obama and Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid.
The rest of the reality may well be this: Pelosi knew that White House lawyers had sanctioned waterboarding in 2002 -- and did not protest.
According to the Senate Intelligence committee, the CIA briefed Pelosi, then the ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, on the interrogation of Abu Zubaydah -- who was waterboarded -- in 2002.
Nancy Pelosi is "pushing back" against charges that she was aware of -- and acquiesced in -- the CIA's harsh interrogations of terrorist detainees nearly from the moment the practice began, reports the Politico Web site. Maybe she's suffering from amnesia.
Maybe, for instance, the speaker doesn't remember that in September 2002, as ranking member of the House Intelligence Committee, she was one of four members of Congress who were briefed by the CIA about the interrogation methods the agency was using on leading detainees. "For more than an hour," the Washington Post reported in 2007, "the bipartisan group . . . was given a virtual tour of the CIA's overseas detention sites and the harsh techniques interrogators had devised to try to make their prisoners talk.
"Among the techniques described," the story continued, "was waterboarding, a practice that years later would be condemned as torture by Democrats and some Republicans on Capitol Hill. But on that day, no objections were raised. Instead, at least two lawmakers in the room asked the CIA to push harder."
Democratic Doublespeak March 27, 2009
UNIONLEADER.COM
Obama's false choices: His budget or recession forever
Speaking of his $3.6 trillion budget, President Obama asserted on Tuesday, "This budget is inseparable from this recovery. It is what lays the foundation for a secure and lasting prosperity."
The first sentence is an impossibility. The second is a non sequitur.
First, the President would have us believe that only his budget can pull the economy out of recession. If it is not passed, there can be no recovery. That is the meaning of "inseparable."
Does anyone on earth, even the President, actually believe that?
The President then claims that his budget creates immediate economic recovery by expanding government control over some sectors of the economy -- namely health care, education and energy -- in the future.
Democratic Doublespeak March 14, 2009
Left Leaning Washington Post Derides President's Earmark Hypocrisy
EARMARKS
THE WASHINGTON POST
He'll Quit Tomorrow
President Obama promises to rein in earmarks. Soon.
LIKE A DIETER who allows himself just one more slice of cake before starting to count calories, President Obama signed the $410 billion omnibus spending bill, then pledged to get tough on congressional earmark spending -- next time.
"This piece of legislation must mark an end to the old way of doing business," Mr. Obama announced. As with the dieter, skepticism is appropriate. The old way was supposed to have ended already.
After all, Mr. Obama, in his inaugural address, proclaimed that "those of us who manage the public's dollars will be held to account, to spend wisely, reform bad habits."
Democratic Doublespeak
The political demands of the moment led Mr. Obama to sign this measure despite its imperfections. That's understandable, but the same pressures will arise next time, too, as members of Congress will be well aware as they consider whether to take the president on over earmarks.
Tradeoffs come with the territory, but Mr. Obama is accepting them after holding himself out as -- indeed, while continuing to hold himself out as -- the avatar of a new way of doing business. "Barack Obama is committed to returning earmarks to less than $7.8 billion a year, the level they were at before 1994, when Republicans took control of Congress and the level of earmarks began rising dramatically," the Obama campaign proclaimed.
"I've pledged to slash earmarks by more than half when I am president of the United States," Mr. Obama said in September. Somehow, that commitment was missing from Wednesday's announcement of future restraint. The dieter didn't set a weight-loss goal.ad_icon
Earmarks account for only a sliver of spending, and the Constitution does give Congress the power of the purse. As Mr. Obama said Wednesday, "Done right, earmarks give legislators the opportunity to direct federal money to worthy projects that benefit people in their district."
Democratic Doublespeak
Moreover, some ugly excesses associated with them have already been curtailed. The amount of earmarked funds has been brought down in the past three years, and disclosure has improved. Mr. Obama's after-the-omnibus-has-left-the-barn proposals would expand on these changes by requiring lawmakers to identify not only the earmarks they receive but the ones they request. Earmarks for private, for-profit companies would be subject to competitive bidding.
When I come to work each day, whether as a commentator for TheStreet.com or a host of Mad Money With Jim Cramer, I have only one thought in mind: helping people with their money.
I fight to help viewers and readers make and preserve capital. I fight for their 401(k)s, for their 529s and their IRAs. I fight for their annuities and for their life insurance policies.
I fight for their profits, trading and investing. And in this horrible market, I fight to keep their losses to a minimum by having some good dividend-yielding stocks from different sectors, some bonds, some gold and some cash.Editor's Picks
Democratic Doublespeak
The lines are drawn pretty clearly: If you can help people make money to be able to retire, enjoy life, pay for college, pay down debt, etc., you are a "good guy," so to speak.
If you take the other side of the trade, you are, well, let's say, a less favored fellow. And if you gun for the gigantic investor class that is out there that includes 90 million people in one form or another, whether it be 401(k)s or individual stocks or pension plans, then you are on my enemies list
This week the Left arrived in Washington, excited about the wonderful things it will do to us -- I mean, for us. They always do it for us.
Liberals say that they, unlike those reactionaries who've held power for too long, want to give us more choices. Abortion-rights advocates want women to have the "right to choose." Gay-rights advocates want the choice of marrying someone of the same sex and serving in the military.
Choice is good. As a libertarian, I'm all over choice. But strangely, today, liberals are mostly about what Americans should not be allowed to choose.
This week the Left arrived in Washington, excited about the wonderful things it will do to us -- I mean, for us. They always do it for us.
Liberals say that they, unlike those reactionaries who've held power for too long, want to give us more choices. Abortion-rights advocates want women to have the "right to choose." Gay-rights advocates want the choice of marrying someone of the same sex and serving in the military.
Choice is good. As a libertarian, I'm all over choice. But strangely, today, liberals are mostly about what Americans should not be allowed to choose.
Democratic Doublespeak November 30, 2008
WALL STREET JOURNAL
The Krugman Recipe for Depression
Massive government spending is no solution to unemployment.
Paul Krugman of the New York Times has been on the attack lately in regard to the New Deal. His new book "The Return of Depression Economics," emphasizes the importance of New Deal-style spending.
He has said the trouble with the New Deal was that it didn't spend enough.
He's also arguing that some writers and economists have been misrepresenting the 1930s to make the effect of FDR's overall policy look worse than it was.
Democratic Doublespeak
I'm interested in part because Mr. Krugman has mentioned me by name. He recently said that I am the one "whose misleading statistics have been widely disseminated on the right."
Mr. Krugman is a new Nobel Laureate, teaches at Princeton University and writes a column for a nationally prominent newspaper. So what he says is believed to be objective by many people, even when it isn't. But the larger reason we should care about the 1930s employment record is that the cure Roosevelt offered, the New Deal, is on everyone else's mind as well. In a recent "60 Minutes" interview, President-elect Barack Obama said, "keep in mind that 1932, 1933, the unemployment rate was 25%, inching up to 30%."
To hear the Democrats at their convention this week, you would get the sense that a recession is merely a technical term [Democratic Doublespeak] for the worst human misery ever visited upon a once-great people.
You'd think Americans were listening to the Democratic speeches as they huddled around their kitchen tables - if they hadn't already been used for firewood - deciding which of their children to pack off to the orphanage and how much tree bark they can afford to eat next week.
Thursday night, Barack Obama proclaimed: "Our economy is in turmoil, and the American promise has been threatened once more." He went on to describe an America reminiscent of "The Grapes of Wrath" [Democratic Doublespeak](if not "Mad Max").
The Reagan revolution is dead! Just don't expect us to bet this election on it!
If there's a theme that's emerged from this week's Democratic National Convention here, this is it. To listen to liberal pundits and party leaders (and Bill Clinton on stage Wednesday night) modern conservatism has had its run and is now kaput. [ Democratic Doublespeak ] Americans -- burdened by "inequality," soaring doctor bills, falling home prices -- are ready for a new Great Society. We are all progressives now.[Democrats Offer Stealth Liberalism]Associated Press
Democratic Doublespeak
But for a party that supposedly has history on its side, the Democrats sure aren't acting like it. Substantively, Barack Obama's agenda would indeed result in the biggest expansion of government and income redistribution since LBJ. [ Democratic Doublespeak ] Not that voters would have picked that up in his acceptance speech last night. Democrats are instead pitching this program to Americans in terms that would make the Gipper proud.
Democratic Doublespeak
Mr. Obama proposes one of the steepest tax increases in modern history, raising rates on personal income, capital gains, dividends and even death. The money Mr. Obama takes from taxpaying Americans he would hand to nontaxpaying Americans in the form of "refundable" tax credits. This is called a "tax hike" and "income redistribution" [Democratic Doublespeak]-- even in the Harvard economics department. And given Mr. Obama's concern with "inequality," you'd assume he'd be proud of it.
Democratic Doublespeak August 27, 2008
NEWSWEEK
The Democrats and the Abortion Wars
Are Obama and Pelosi dodging the life-and-death question?
A few years ago, Richard Doerflinger, a pro-life Roman Catholic intellectual with decades of experience in the trenches of America's culture wars, was invited to debate the moral and legal status of the human embryo before a large class of Harvard undergraduates.
During the course of the discussion, Doerflinger's Harvard faculty interlocutor drew a timeline of human biological development on the blackboard: conception, implantation, brain waves, viability, birth and so forth.
Democratic Doublespeak
His challenge to Doerflinger was to defend, in a nonarbitrary way and without reference to religious principles, the notion that society should recognize moral value and legal rights at any particular point along that line. If here, why here? If there, why there?
After the class, as the conversation continued with a few students and the professor, Doerflinger took a piece of chalk and extended the timeline to the end of the blackboard, where he wrote "Tenure." The students laughed, and got the message. The only point along that continuum that wouldn't be arbitrary was the starting point—conception.
Perhaps Doerflinger should send his extended timeline to the Democratic National Convention in Denver.
Biden, on a post-debate appearance on MSNBC, October 30, 2007: “The only guy on the other side who’s qualified is John McCain.”
Biden appearing on The Daily Show, August 2, 2005: “John McCain is a personal friend, a great friend, and I would be honored to run with or against John McCain, because I think the country would be better off, be well off no matter who...”
On Meet the Press, November 27, 2005: “I’ve been calling for more troops for over two years, along with John McCain and others subsequent to my saying that.”
On Obama:Reacting to an Obama speech on counterterrorism, August 1, 2007: “‘Look, the truth is the four major things he called for, well, hell that’s what I called for,’ Biden said today on MSNBC’s Hardball, echoing comments he made earlier in the day at an event promoting his book at the National Press Club. Biden added, ‘I’m glad he’s talking about these things.’”
Democratic Doublespeak
Democratic Doublespeak July 30, 2008
By INVESTOR'S BUSINESS DAILY
Obama's Global Tax
The fun thing about an Obama-Biden ticket is that the McCain campaign can point to a new awkward comment by Joe Biden — either on the importance of experience, in praise of McCain, or in support of invading Iraq — that contradicts the stands and qualities of the Democratic nominee for every day from now until Election Day.
Election '08: A plan by Barack Obama to redistribute American wealth on a global level is moving forward in the Senate. It follows Marxist theology — from each according to his ability, to each according to his need.
We are citizens of the world, [ Democratic Doublespeak ] Sen. Obama told thousands of nonvoting Germans during his recent tour of the Middle East and Europe. And if the Global Poverty Act (S. 2433) he has sponsored becomes law, which is almost certain if he wins in November, we're also going to be taxpayers of the world.
Speaking in Berlin, Obama said: "While the 20th century taught us that we share a common destiny, the 21st has revealed a world more intertwined than at any time in human history."
This week John McCain officially released the details of his economic recovery tax plan. The howls of protest from the left were both loud and predictable.
The Obama campaign ripped into the McCain plan with the mantra of "tax cuts for the rich," while leftwing special interest groups claimed that McCain would blow a supersized hole in the budget deficit.
Yes, that bogeyman issue of the budget deficit is back again. That's the issue that's never an issue except when Republicans want to cut taxes, in which case deficits are suddenly one of the four horsemen of the apocalypse.
Democratic Doublespeak
Never mind that on Nancy Pelosi's watch the budget deficit has more than doubled--to $400 billion--in 18 months. That inconvenient truth hasn't stopped a barrage of attacks from the media and union-funded groups directed at McCain's "$5.7 trillion tax cut plan."
McCain wants to retain the Bush investment tax cuts; repeal the alternative minimum tax; cut the corporate income tax rate to 25 percent from 35 percent, and offer Americans an alternative flat tax (an idea he borrowed from me, by the way).
Former Clinton labor secretary Robert Reich calls the McCain tax cut "the most financially irresponsible plan I've seen in years." And even the newspaper I write for, the Wall Street Journal, joined in the charge of media skepticism with a headline that read: "McCain Tax Cuts Would Bloat Deficit or Take Huge Spending Curbs."
I know, because admirers of Barack Obama tell me, that this year's election poses a choice between a candidate who represents a fresh approach to problems and one who offers a dreary continuation of the status quo.
That much I understand. What I sometimes have trouble keeping straight is which candidate is which.
On the subject of elementary and secondary education, the two seem to have gotten their roles completely mixed up.
Democratic Doublespeak
Obama is the staunch defender of the existing public school monopoly, and he's allergic to anything that subverts it. John McCain, on the other hand, went before the NAACP last week to argue for something new and daring.
That something is to facilitate greater parental choice in education. McCain wants to expand a Washington, D.C. program that provides federally funded scholarships so poor students can attend private schools. More than 7,000 kids, he reported, have applied for these vouchers, but only 1,900 can be accommodated.
Democratic Doublespeak July 16, 2008
NATIONAL POST
The culprits behind credit, inflation risks
Terence Corcoran, Financial Post Published: Wednesday, July 16, 2008
Two major related threats loom over the world economy: credit crises and rising inflation. What do these two menaces have in common? Bankers, hedge-fund managers, speculators and capitalism in general have been taking the hit for the economic turmoil, both for credit risk and inflation.
But the looming collapse of Fannie Mae and Freddie Macin the United States should help change the focus a little. We are now getting down to the heart of the matter, which turns out not to be rampant capitalism but out of control back-door socialism.
There is nothing free market about the two American mortgage backers, hybrid institutions created by the U.S. government to support mortgages and make home buying easier and more affordable for Americans.
Democratic Doublespeak
Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, prodded by Congress and regulators, socialized trillions of dollars of mortgage risk on the backs of U. S. taxpayers. Along with dozens of other U. S. government programs that lured American's into a home-buying frenzy, the two institutions -- now getting even more socialist backing from Washington -- stand among the leading creators of the U. S. mortgage and credit crisis.
In Washington, Moral Hazard is a dead country singer. Governments and investors around the world put money in Fannie Mae and Freddie Macsecurities, knowing that if disaster struck Washington would bail them out. And so it has, the bailout reaching absurd levels yesterday when two branches of Washington power, the Securities and Exchange Commission and U. S. Treasury Secretary Henry Paulson, moved to protect Fan and Fred shareholders.
In an election campaign in which not only young liberals, but also some people who are neither young nor liberals, seem absolutely mesmerized by the skilled rhetoric of Barack Obama, facts have receded even further into the background than usual.
As the hypnotic mantra of "change" is repeated endlessly, few people even raise the question of whether what few specifics we hear represent any real change, much less a change for the better.
Raising taxes, increasing government spending and demonizing business? That is straight out of the New Deal of the 1930s. [Democratic Doublespeak]
ASK passers-by on any street in America what their top issue is for the upcoming presidential election, and they'll all answer the same thing: the Foreign Service Intelligence Act.
Gas prices, home foreclosures, the Iraq war - all pale in comparison. Single mothers gathered at the laundromat are all talking about one thing: FISA.
And if you get them to stop yammering on about immunity for telecoms, you won't be able to shut them up about their next favorite outrage: Barack Obama's decision to opt out of public financing. [Democratic Doublespeak]
If that seems strong, consider how a House subcommittee hauled in David Addington, Vice President Dick Cheney's chief of staff, for a taste of the third degree on waterboarding.
Rep. Bill Delahunt, who isn't even on the subcommittee, took his shot anyway, asking Addington about the interrogation method. Addington balked, explaining that the hearings were being broadcast on C-SPAN and terrorists watching might use the information.
Politics: Does being a Democrat justify glee at putting Republican opponents in al-Qaida's cross hairs? Or does it mean a green light to make ethnic slurs? Both occurred last week, minus apologies.
A year ago in July, a National Intelligence Estimate warned that al Qaeda had "protected or regenerated key elements of its Homeland attack capability," meaning it could be poised to strike America again.
The political reaction was instantaneous and damning. "This clearly says al Qaeda is not beaten," said Michael Scheuer, the former CIA spook turned antiterror scold.
What a difference 10 months – and a surge – make.
CIA Director Michael Hayden painted a far more optimistic picture in an interview yesterday in the Washington Post. "On balance, we are doing pretty well," he said.
Democratic Doublespeak
"Near strategic defeat of al Qaeda in Iraq. Near strategic defeat for al Qaeda in Saudi Arabia. Significant setbacks for al Qaeda globally – and here I'm going to use the word 'ideologically' – as a lot of the Islamic world pushes back on their form of Islam."
When Sam Houston was still hanging his hat in Tennessee in the 1830s, it wasn't uncommon for fellow Tennesseans who were packing up and moving south and west to hang a sign on their cabins that read "GTT" – Gone to Texas.
Today obstetricians, surgeons and other doctors might consider reviving the practice. Over the past three years, some 7,000 M.D.s have flooded into Texas, many from Tennessee.
Why? Two words: Tort reform.
In 2003 and in 2005, Texas enacted a series of reforms to the state's civil justice system. They are stunning in their success. Texas Medical Liability Trust, one of the largest malpractice insurance companies in the state, has slashed its premiums by 35%, saving doctors some $217 million over four years. There is also a competitive malpractice insurance industry in Texas, with over 30 companies competing for business. This is driving rates down.
Democratic Doublespeak May 13, 2008
NEWSWEEK
The Left Starts to Rethink Reagan
Barack Obama's not the only one calling him a 'transformational' leader. So is Sean Wilentz.
The outcome of this November's election may hinge on a single question: which presidential candidate will prevail among the "Reagan Democrats"? Those traditionally Democratic voters made history—and a place in the political lexicon—in 1980 when they bolted their party's disarrayed ranks to swing the polls in Ronald Reagan's favor.
Until recently, however, few liberal-leaning historians took a respectful look at the Reagan phenomenon. That's finally changing, with the publication of Sean Wilentz's new "The Age of Reagan," even as Hillary Clinton and Barack Obama—and John McCain—seek the support of that crucial bloc. NEWSWEEK's Evan Thomas moderated a conversation about the Gipper between Wilentz, a professed liberal, and NEWSWEEK's George F. Will, a longtime Reagan admirer.
THOMAS: Sean, why have you taken a look at Reagan, and have other historians started to take another look at Reagan?WILENTZ: It's interesting. It's no secret that intellectuals, generally being liberals, didn't think much of Ronald Reagan at the time. Unlike Roosevelt, who got covered right away—as soon as he died there were books out about [him]—it took people a long time to catch up with Ronald Reagan.
But I think that now they can no longer ignore him. His impact on the world and country, whether you like it or not, was so important that to ignore him is to ignore an entirety of American politics.
'WHY don't we just vote to strike tonight - and we'll decide to morrow what we're striking for?"
Those were the words of a student protester thoughtfully deliberating at Yale University, as recounted by Roger Kimball in his book on the left, "The Long March." It was a question that captured much of the heedless spirit of the student demonstrations of the 1960s, for which "May 1968" is shorthand.
That spring 40 years ago saw a radical takeover of Columbia University - eventually duplicated at other elite campuses - and student protests around the world. In France, the government was rocked to its foundations; in the Eastern Bloc, a crevice was opened up in the Berlin Wall. Here at home, campus life became synonymous with a straitened leftism, and the post-World War II political consensus shattered.
Democratic Doublespeak April 8, 2008
See John Murtha King of Pork
Democratic Doublespeak March 12, 2008
ABC, NBC Continue to Ignore Personal Responsibility for Foreclosures
Four months after CMI released a study on debt coverage,only CBS addresses the character question in mortgage crisis stories.
Who would you blame if you took out a half-million-dollar loan and couldn’t make the payments?
Last November the Culture and Media Institute and its sister Media Research Center division, the Business and Media Institute, found that NBC and ABC consistently ignored the issue of personal responsibility for consumer debt, while CBS was the most likely network to promote responsibility.
Nearly four months later, on March 6, home foreclosures have reached a record high and many homes are not worth what owners owe. Though the mortgage crisis has grown worse, nothing has changed in the network coverage.
Democratic Doublespeak February 25, 2008
From: The New York Post
PELOSI VS. AMERICA
"...Most repugnant, Pelosi's Democrats are less worried about civil liberties than they are about crossing a rich source of their campaign cash - [Democratic Doublespeak] America's odious tort bar.
The trial lawyers want to kill a provision in the Senate bill that protects US phone companies that cooperated with the government in post-9/11 surveillance.
One can only hope that Pelosi's members hear from their constituents back home about their cavalier and selfish disregard for their country's security..."
Can you believe it?
Putting millions of American lives in danger, so that trial lawyers will be able to file more lawsuits and get richer than they are already.
DEMOCRATIC DOUBLESPEAK rears its ugly head once again.
Dems/libs act like they care about "working families" once again, when all they care about is creating a culture of victims so that they can pick all of our pockets, to expand government further.
Democratic Doublespeak Monday, November 21, 2007
Imitation Debate By Democrats
Wolf Blitzer stated at the beginning that he would bring candidates back to the question asked, if they did not answer.
I think he really intended to.
It turned out to be a joke, the way candidates gave some almost non response to practically every questioned asked, then moved on to their usual pattern of blame Bush, then get gushy over what redistribution plan will make audience members think they are in for a new nanny-state handout they did not earn themselves, then a final suggestion of their backing of "working families, children and in one case a 91 year old woman"
Watching audience members nod their approval and happiness as if something thoughtful was being said was especially stomach turning.
By the conclusion of most responses, the original question had barely been touched, if anyone could still remember it.
Wolf tried but failed to get some thoughtful responses and then got overwhelmed by the candidates' aggressiveness to keep talking about what they wanted to talk about, ending all chance to hear any quality answers, if they'd had any, which they did not.
The format, questioning and responses were amateurish beyond comprehension.
Even Democrat Juan Williams a guest on Martha McCallum's show the next morning, seem to laugh at what was referred to as a debate.Camlow is online now Add to Camlow's Reputation Report Post Reply With Quote
By John Fund
Democratic Doublespeak Monday, October, 2007
Fairness Doctrine Should Be Called 'Unfairness Doctrine'
Indiana Rep. Mike Pence will attempt to pass legislation hoping to permanently ban the Fairness Doctrine.
Many liberals are now actively trying to revive it in an effort to silence their critics.
The FCC scrapped the Fairness Doctrine in 1987. Before it did, it required broadcasters to provide equal time to all sides of "controversial" issues.
Bill Monroe, a former host of NBC's "Meet the Press," said this led to a "timid, don't-rock-the-boat coverage."
Newsweek's Howard Fineman recently noted, it "effectively kept partisan shows off the airwaves," so that in 1980 there were a mere 75 talk radio stations. Today there are 1,800.
Liberals always try to present themselves as tolerant and broadminded and others the opposite of that.
In reality campuses across the nation, like the liberal movement itself wants only its side to be told.
Controlling all the major Marxist entities- the New York Times, NBC,ABC,CBS and practically all of the Mainstream Media isn't enough for liberals, they want it all including talk radio.
October 29, 2007 Democratic DoubleSpeak
House Speaker Nancy Pelose Promised A New Direction
One-hundred six (106) of the bills signed into law by President Bush this year, nearly half (46) name post offices, courthouses or roads.
Another 44 bills were procedural types such as reconstruction of the I-35 bridge in Minneapolis. The remain 14 bills were simply extensions of existing laws.
The “new direction.” deserves the Democratic mantra "Democratic DoubleSpeak".
October 15, 2007 Democratic DoubleSpeak
Clinton to Raise Social Security Taxes after Promising Not To
ABC News has made comments suggesting Hillary Clinton is considering a Social Security tax hike.
She also wants to adjust NAFTA and postpone all new free trade agreements.
We already know her Health Care plan is a huge expansion of a government entitlement with some serious deception thrown in.
Luckily the polls quickly showed that her Marxist baby bond did not go over well, so she dropped it.
Hillary wants the government in every aspect of our lives.
July 1, 2007 Democratic DoubleSpeak
Democratic Committee Attacks Active Reservist-Claims Lack Of Troop Support
House member Kirk voted against the surge and also met with the President who told the President he would no longer support the war until improvement was clear.
Democratic Doublespeak
Congressman Kirk is a Naval Reserve intelligence officer who served during Iraq, Haiti, and Bosnia.
He was named 'Intelligence Officer of the Year' in 1999 for his combat service in Kosovo, by the U.S. Navy.
He has served in Iraq and still serves monthly in the Pentagon.
Democrats will do anything to gain power.
May 25, 2007
DEMOCRATS CONTINUE DECEIT, HYPOCRISY WITH PORK/EARMARKS
Where Does One Start when it comes to Democratic Doublespeak?
The choices are endless, so let's start with the latest.
We will balance the budget by 2012 by finding "$900 billion in additional revenues."
Translation-TAX INCREASES!!
They would let the recent tax cuts expire in 2010. This means among other things bringing back the marriage penalty tax and cutting the child tax credit in half.
Democrats want you to believe that they intend to slow the growth in spending.
Democratic Doublespeak
They are using their usual deception with the term PAYGO. No matter how glib their wording, the reality is that PAYGO will become PAYMORE.
Little would be done to curb welfare and other entitlements which are soaring. The average family would see a tax increase of $2641 per year.
A family of four earning $50,000 would see taxes go up 132 percent. A single parent with two children earning $30,000 would see taxes raised 67 percent, according to Senate Minority Leader Mitch McConnell, if the president's tax relief is not made permanent.
Some Democrats blame it on the war. Total defense spending takes 4% of GDP. Defense spending as a percent of GDP is a tick away from its lowest point in 50 years.
More on PAYGO.
To implement PAYGO, tax cuts must be offset by tax increases elsewhere or with cuts in entitlement spending, which would be helpful if those cuts applied to all entitlements.
Instead, Democrats stayed away from entitlements already in place, which have huge future costs.
Democratic Doublespeak
PAYGO:
Social Security is growing at a 5 percent clip annually, it will not solve this.
It would not solve the Medicare problem growing at 9 percent annualy.
The Medicare drug law is supposed to add $ 2 trillion dollars over 20 years, no solution there and medicaid is growing 7 percent per year.
No solution there.
I interviewed two plumbing company owners over the weekend about Barack Obama's economic proposals for small business.
One has 15 employees and 12 trucks. The other has 52 employees and 34 trucks. They're Joe the Plumber, writ large.
Democratic Doublespeak
Both owners had the same reaction to Obama's proposed new taxes and mandates. To not have their bottom lines reduced by government fiat, both said they'd be forced to lay off employees.
Democratic Doublespeak October 31, 2008
See Barney Frank, Maxine Waters, all committee Democrats lie and defend Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac under their buddy Franklin Raines.
This gave us today's crisis---They should all be in jail.
Democratic Doublespeak September 11, 2008
Senator Robert Byrd Sneaks In Tariffs To Create Pork Which Will Cost American Jobs
Senators Robert Byrd and Sherrod Brown, please take a bow. The West Virginia and Ohio Democrats have succeeded in getting Japan to slap another year of punitive duties on some U.S. products because of their attempts to rig trade rules for their business buddies.
Robert Byrd
Specifically, Japan's cabinet decided late last month to slap a 10% tariff on ball bearings and tapered roller bearings that could knock U.S. producers out of competition in Japan. The decision cited what Japan's Ministry of Finance accurately calls "illegal disbursement under the 'Byrd Amendment.'"
Democratic Doublespeak
That follows a European Union decision in May to extend punitive duties on a range of other American products. The tariffs hit just as U.S. exports have become the main source of American growth amid the housing slump and credit crunch.
Europe and Japan are hurting their own consumers here, but they are in the legal right. The Byrd Amendment is a toxic 2000 law that distributed tariff money not to the U.S. government but directly to U.S. companies that complained about "unfair" foreign competition. The World Trade Organization ruled in 2002 that the Byrd Amendment violated global trade rules, and Congress finally repealed it in early 2006. But the disbursements continue to complaining U.S. companies for as many years as it takes to collect duty due for alleged dumping of foreign products before October 1 of 2007; last year alone the payout was more than $264 million
The U.S. economy - yes, that economy - grew at a 3.3 percent annual rate last quarter. This no doubt caused consternation at the highest levels of the Democratic Party, perhaps forcing some to consider a new convention film at the last minute: "Dude, Where's My Recession?"
google_ad_width = 468;google_ad_height = 15;//-->
Democratic Double Speak
The smallest investment, for the largest return, on the Internet-Learn More-Click Photo
