Mike's News: Catching Up On Stories That Caught My Attention

Have you read these?

While the Unemployed Look for Work, V.P. Biden to Union Bosses: Let's Dance!

President Obama castigated bank and financial executives for partying at expensive resorts at the same time they had their hands out for government help. Funny how Obama decided that big union bosses partying in Miami Beach at the same time they are begging the federal government to bail out the auto workers was no big deal.

In fact, Vice President Biden showed up at the big pow wow at the ritzy Fountainebleau Hotel on Miami Beach and told the fat cats “You all brought me to the dance a long time ago, and it’s time we start dancing.”

Biden made sure there was no television coverage of his speech. Odd behavior for an Administration that promised a new transparency.

The main topic at the meeting was the card check law that Obama supports which would make it easier for Union bosses to force more workers into becoming union members and paying the dues that make all this partying possible.

Workforce Fairness has more:

Tenn. School Censors "In God We Trust" & "God Bless the USA" from School Posters

And you thought schools were for teaching?

Attorneys with the Alliance Defense Fund filed a lawsuit Tuesday on behalf of parents and students at Lakeview Elementary School in Wilson County after school officials ordered “God Bless the USA,” “In God We Trust,” and other phrases referencing God and prayer to be covered up on posters before they could be displayed in the school’s hallways. The posters were hand-drawn by students and their families to announce “See You at the Pole,” a voluntary, student-led prayer event held outside of class time.


House Speaker Pelosi and Senate Majority Leader Reid in Foul Mouth Shouting Match!

Democrats cannot even be civil among themselves!

Profanity flies in heated Dem session
By DAVID ROGERS
The Politico
March 5, 2009

After an angry, swearing late night meeting among top Democrats, Congress voted Friday to give itself another five days to try to complete a long-overdue omnibus spending bill that had become a growing embarrassment for party leaders and President Barack Obama.

Senate Democrats had abruptly pulled back Thursday night after finding themselves one vote short of the 60 needed to cut off debate. The action infuriated Speaker Nancy Pelosi so much that the California Democrat wanted to abandon the $409.6 billion measure and instead push through a stripped-down continuing resolution to keep the government operating through Sept. 30.

Senate Majority Leader Harry Reid (D.-Nev.) and his deputy, Majority Whip Richard Durbin (D.-Ill.) were called to Pelosi’s office late Thursday night and ultimately prevailed in their argument that Democrats should try to salvage the bill, which includes critical spending increases for vital agencies. But the heated, sometimes profane, exchanges were described as “ugly” by Democrats on both sides of the Capitol. Staff, kicked out in the hall, could hear the yelling, and Pelosi herself seemed a little abashed the next day, joking that nothing her leadership could say to her now would match the night before.

Conservatives For Patient's Rights (CPR) Fight Obama Plan to Take Away Health Care Freedom

Last week President Obama held another of his famous White House Summits. This time it was dog and pony show designed to provide cover for massive and expensive government intrusion into healthcare. Spotting another trillion dollar boondoggle, the Stock Market promptly tanked. But there's more to this scheme than the huge price tag:

Here's what Conservatives for Patient's Rights have to say:

Hillary Clinton Leaves European Allies Underwhelmed

Do you miss Condi Rice yet?

Hillary's gaffe in handing the Russian Foreign Minister a cheesy button that said "reset" in English but with a Russian word that translates to "overcharge" wasn't her only gaffe during her recent European visit.

Tongue-tied Clinton gets warm EU welcome
By David Brunnstrom
Reuters
Mar 6, 2009

BRUSSELS (Reuters) - Hillary Clinton raised eyebrows on her first visit to Europe as secretary of state when she mispronounced her EU counterparts' names and claimed U.S. democracy was older than Europe's.
...
Tiredness appeared to show Friday when she answered questions in front of 500 young Europeans at the European Parliament, where she was the highest-ranking U.S. visitor since the late U.S. President Ronald Reagan in 1985.

A veteran politician, Clinton compared the complex European political environment to that of the two-party U.S. system, before adding:

"I have never understood multiparty democracy.

"It is hard enough with two parties to come to any resolution, and I say this very respectfully, because I feel the same way about our own democracy, which has been around a lot longer than European democracy."

The remark provoked much headshaking in the parliament of a bloc that likes to trace back its democratic tradition thousands of years to the days of classical Greece.

One working lunch later with EU leaders, Clinton raised more eyebrows when she referred to EU foreign policy chief Javier Solana, who stood beside her, as "High Representative Solano."

She also dubbed European Commission External Relations Commissioner Benita Ferrero-Waldner as "Benito."

People's Cube has more Hillary button fun here.

It's Parody Now but How Long Before It's True?

A lighter moment!

Obama to Drop Shield if Russia Helps with Limbaugh
by Scott Ott
ScrappleFace
(2009-03-05)

— President Barack Obama has reportedly written another private note to his Russian counterpart offering to halt deployment of a defensive nuclear missile shield in Europe, this time in exchange for Russia’s help in dealing with U.S. talk-radio host Rush Limbaugh.

The White House immediately denied the existence of the letter to President Dmitry Medvedev, but acknowledged “ongoing internal deliberations over a measured response using all the tools of U.S. power, including diplomacy.”

Dealing with Mr. Limbaugh has taken the Obama administration’s focus off of other global trouble spots like North Korea, Iran and Chicago.

Read the rest here.

Video Montage: Obama on Earmarks

And yet he would sign the current spending bill which is loaded with Pork? Is this the change people voted for?

Obama Out to Bury Reagan Revolution.

I said it here on March 3. Daniel Henninger at the Wall Street Journal adds more:

The Democratic idea bank of Robert & Robert says it's safe to unload on Ronald Reagan.

Robert Reich: "It is the boldest budget we have seen since the Reagan administration, and drives a nail in the coffin of Reaganomics. We can basically say goodbye to the philosophy espoused by Ronald Reagan and Margaret Thatcher."

Robert Shrum: "Obama is not only unwinding Reagan's policies, he is offering a Rooseveltian paradigm that justifies government pragmatically."

Henninger's answer?

If the Democrats are willing to bet the entire U.S. economy on a 1931 theory known as the Keynesian multiplier, surely Republicans can excavate and relearn the core idea handed down to them by Ronald Reagan. That idea was known as economic growth.

Freed to choose between these two competing ideas, I'm guessing many voters would go for growth. All that's needed is just one Republican who can explain this idea halfway as well as Ronald Reagan.

Reaganism works every time it is tried!

Chinese Testing Obama in International Waters

WASHINGTON (AP) - Chinese ships surrounded and harassed a Navy mapping ship in international waters off China, at one point coming within 25 feet of the American boat and strewing debris in its path, the Defense Department said Monday. The Obama administration said it would continue naval operations in the South China Sea, most of which China considers its territory, and protested to China about what it called reckless behavior that endangered lives.

At one point during the incident Sunday the unarmed USNS Impeccable turned fire hoses on an approaching Chinese ship in self defense, the Pentagon said. At another point a Chinese ship played chicken with the Americans, stopping dead in front of the Impeccable as it tried to sail away, forcing the civilian mariners to slam on the brakes.

"We view these as unprofessional maneuvers" and a violation of international law, Pentagon spokesman Bryan Whitman said.

Obama Acting More Like Cheney Than Change?

Don't say we didn't warn you!

Obama Channels Cheney
Obama adopts Bush view on the powers of the presidency
The Wall Street Journal
MARCH 6, 2009

The Obama Administration this week released its predecessor's post-9/11 legal memoranda in the name of "transparency," producing another round of feel-good Bush criticism. Anyone interested in President Obama's actual executive-power policies, however, should look at his position on warrantless wiretapping. Dick Cheney must be smiling.
...
The Obama Justice Department has adopted a legal stance identical to, if not more aggressive than, the Bush version. It argues that the court-forced disclosure of the surveillance programs would cause "exceptional harm to national security" by exposing intelligence sources and methods. Last Friday the Ninth Circuit denied the latest emergency motion to dismiss, again kicking matters back to Judge Walker.

In court documents filed hours later, Justice argues that the decision to release classified information "is committed to the discretion of the Executive Branch, and is not subject to judicial review. Moreover, the Court does not have independent power . . . to order the Government to grant counsel access to classified information when the Executive Branch has denied them such access." The brief continues that federal judges are "ill-equipped to second-guess the Executive Branch."

That's about as pure an assertion of Presidential power as they come, and we're beginning to wonder if the White House has put David Addington, Mr. Cheney's chief legal aide, on retainer. The practical effect is to prevent the courts from reviewing the legality of the warrantless wiretapping program that Mr. Obama repeatedly claimed to find so heinous -- at least before taking office. Justice, by the way, is making the same state secrets argument in a separate lawsuit involving rendition and a Boeing subsidiary.