"Technically, Senate and House rules require that all bills be read in their entirety three times before debate begins, with a 24-hour and one-week respite between readings to allow elected representatives to digest what’s in the bills before voting on them. But rules are made to be suspended, as frequently happens on Capitol Hill. Indeed, earlier this year, hardly any member of Congress read the 1,100-page stimulus bill because copies of the bill only became available barely 13 hours before the final vote.
"Passing the even more massive health care reform bill without reading it or allowing the public to do so will qualify as among the worse instances ever of legislative malpractice. The shameless message Democrats are thus sending to the American people, with tacit approval of the White House, is this: 'We won’t read the bill, and neither will you.'”
Saturday, October 10, 2009
Christian Toto: Wanda Sykes Returns to D.C., Resumes Cheerleading for the First Couple
"Why, for example, is the openly gay performer not frustrated by Obama’s refusal to embrace gay marriage? That would fuel some pretty prickly material, but she never holds the president accountable during the special."
and
"She still has enough zingers to bring both sides together for a spell. Her view on illegal immigration:
"'They’re not illegal; they’re undocumented. … If someone broke into my house … and vacuumed, I might be a little confused but I ain’t calling the cops." (liar -- Robert)
"Her best material reflects how a black person reacts to Obama’s presidency:
"'It’s a little bittersweet. … The first black president and the country is broke.'
"She also scores by explaining Obama’s decision not to adopt a rescue dog for his family:
"'The man has to rescue a country that’s been abused by its previous owner.'" (Since when does the president "own" the United States? Pathetic -- Robert)
and
"She still has enough zingers to bring both sides together for a spell. Her view on illegal immigration:
"'They’re not illegal; they’re undocumented. … If someone broke into my house … and vacuumed, I might be a little confused but I ain’t calling the cops." (liar -- Robert)
"Her best material reflects how a black person reacts to Obama’s presidency:
"'It’s a little bittersweet. … The first black president and the country is broke.'
"She also scores by explaining Obama’s decision not to adopt a rescue dog for his family:
"'The man has to rescue a country that’s been abused by its previous owner.'" (Since when does the president "own" the United States? Pathetic -- Robert)
John Rosenberg: Nobel Committee Chooses ‘Hope’ Over ‘Change’
"Until reminded by Mona Charen, I had forgotten (or repressed the memory) that Rigoberta Menchu won the Nobel Prize in 1992 for her fraudulent autobiography I, Rigoberta Menchu. As evidence of their privileging (don’t you hate it when people make verbs out of nouns?) 'hope' over 'change,' perhaps the Nobels awarded the prize to 'I, Barack' for much the same reason — to honor his promise more than his performance. Just as they honored the 'inner truth' of what she had written and said more than the external, literal, factual accuracy of her pronouncements.
"The similarities between these two icons of the multicultural left are enhanced, of course, by the recent revival, summarized ably here and here by Ron Radosh, of suggestions that Obama may not have been the actual, literal author of his own autobiography.
"For those of you who’ve forgotten (or are too young to remember), I, Rigoberta Menchu purported to be the autobiography of a poor Guatemalan who overcame extreme poverty (a younger brother starved to death, etc.) and violent oppression at the hands of Guatemala’s brutal right-wing oligarchs (who, she wrote, burned another brother to death before her very own young eyes). Her book, composed from tapes recorded by E. Burgos-Debray, an ethnologist and the wife of French Marxist theorist and revolutionary (he was in Bolivia with Che Guevara) Regis Debray, told its gripping story in moving and telling details and quickly elevated her to iconic status among European intellectuals and American academics.
"Alas, it was a good story, but only a story; many of the most dramatic details she recounted never actually happened."
Yid with Lid: If You Disagree With the POTUS' Nobel Prize, THE TERRORISTS WIN Say Democratic Party Leaders
"Perhaps these party leaders did not have time to see many of the reactions to the President's award. Many LIBERALS thought it was absurd."
and
"Joe Klein also of Time Said
'I'm a big fan of patient, rigorous diplomacy--and there's a certain lovely irony to any prize that brings the Taliban and the neoconservative Commentary crowd together in high dudgeon--but let's face it: this prize is premature to the point of ridiculousness.'"
and
"Joe Klein also of Time Said
'I'm a big fan of patient, rigorous diplomacy--and there's a certain lovely irony to any prize that brings the Taliban and the neoconservative Commentary crowd together in high dudgeon--but let's face it: this prize is premature to the point of ridiculousness.'"
Ben Lieberman: ‘Green Job’ subsidies in global warming bill destroy far more U.S. jobs than they create
"Real world experience bears this out. Governments that subsidize or mandate green jobs reap fewer overall jobs and a weaker economy.
"Green job advocates once touted Spain’s aggressive alternative energy policy as a model for America. But, today, Spain’s green-jobs bubble has burst.
"Unemployment there stands at 18 percent, nearly twice that of the U.S. Gabriel Calzada, economics professor at Madrid’s King Juan Carlos University, estimates that each green job Spain creates prevents 2.2 other jobs from being created.
"The Danish think-tank CEPOS recently studied wind energy in Denmark, another oft-cited model for America. CEPOS found than each wind energy job there costs the government $90,000 to $140,000 annually — much more than the jobs pay. Nor are these jobs sustainable. Once the government handouts end, so do the jobs.
"The same lesson can be seen in the U.S. California has led the states in pursuing a green jobs agenda. Environmentalists often cite it as a model for the rest of the nation. But California also stands out as having higher unemployment and energy costs and a weaker economy than nearly every other state.
"Waxman-Markey would take the nation down the same job-killing path. Some jobs would be destroyed entirely. Others would be outsourced to nations that don’t drink the cap-and-trade Kool-Aid.
"China, India, and other developing nations have wisely stated that they won’t accept similar global warming restrictions on their own economies, and for good reason. They know full well that the policies giving rise to green jobs kill many more jobs in the process."
"Green job advocates once touted Spain’s aggressive alternative energy policy as a model for America. But, today, Spain’s green-jobs bubble has burst.
"Unemployment there stands at 18 percent, nearly twice that of the U.S. Gabriel Calzada, economics professor at Madrid’s King Juan Carlos University, estimates that each green job Spain creates prevents 2.2 other jobs from being created.
"The Danish think-tank CEPOS recently studied wind energy in Denmark, another oft-cited model for America. CEPOS found than each wind energy job there costs the government $90,000 to $140,000 annually — much more than the jobs pay. Nor are these jobs sustainable. Once the government handouts end, so do the jobs.
"The same lesson can be seen in the U.S. California has led the states in pursuing a green jobs agenda. Environmentalists often cite it as a model for the rest of the nation. But California also stands out as having higher unemployment and energy costs and a weaker economy than nearly every other state.
"Waxman-Markey would take the nation down the same job-killing path. Some jobs would be destroyed entirely. Others would be outsourced to nations that don’t drink the cap-and-trade Kool-Aid.
"China, India, and other developing nations have wisely stated that they won’t accept similar global warming restrictions on their own economies, and for good reason. They know full well that the policies giving rise to green jobs kill many more jobs in the process."
Humberto Fontova: Che Guevara: Assassin, Coward, Imbecile
“'To send men to the firing squad, judicial proof is unnecessary,' Carroll would have heard from the chief executioner, named Ernesto 'Che' Guevara. 'These procedures are an archaic bourgeois detail. This is a revolution! And a revolutionary must become a cold killing machine motivated by pure hate. We must create the pedagogy of the paredon (The Wall)!'”
and
"So the scope of the mass murder is unclear. So the exact number of widows and orphans is in dispute. So the number of gagged and blindfolded men who Che sent – without trials – to be bound to a stake and blown apart by bullets runs from the hundreds to the thousands.
"But the mass executioner gets a standing ovation by the same people in the U.S who oppose capitol punishment! Is there a psychiatrist in the house?!
"But vengeance – much less justice – had nothing to do with this bloodbath. Che’s murderous method in La Cabana fortress in 1959 was exactly Stalin’s murderous method in the Katyn Forest in 1940. Like Stalin’s massacre of the Polish officer corps in the Katyn forest, like Stalin’s Great Terror against his own officer corps a few years earlier, Che’s (Castro-ordered) firing squad marathons were a perfectly rational and cold-blooded exercise that served their purpose ideally. This bloodbath decapitated – literally and figuratively the first ranks of Cuba’s Contras.
"Equally important, his massacre cowed and terrorized. These were all public trials. And the executions, right down to the final shattering of the skull with the coup de grace from a massive .45 slug fired at five paces, were public too. Guevara made it a policy for his men to parade the families and friends of the executed before the blood-, bone- and brain-spattered paredon (The Wall, and Pink Floyd had nothing to do with this one).
"The Red Terror had come to Cuba. 'We will make our hearts cruel, hard, and immovable ... we will not quiver at the sight of a sea of enemy blood. Without mercy, without sparing, we will kill our enemies in scores of thousands; let them drown themselves in their own blood! Let there be floods of the blood of the bourgeois – more blood, as much as possible.'”
and
"So the scope of the mass murder is unclear. So the exact number of widows and orphans is in dispute. So the number of gagged and blindfolded men who Che sent – without trials – to be bound to a stake and blown apart by bullets runs from the hundreds to the thousands.
"But the mass executioner gets a standing ovation by the same people in the U.S who oppose capitol punishment! Is there a psychiatrist in the house?!
"But vengeance – much less justice – had nothing to do with this bloodbath. Che’s murderous method in La Cabana fortress in 1959 was exactly Stalin’s murderous method in the Katyn Forest in 1940. Like Stalin’s massacre of the Polish officer corps in the Katyn forest, like Stalin’s Great Terror against his own officer corps a few years earlier, Che’s (Castro-ordered) firing squad marathons were a perfectly rational and cold-blooded exercise that served their purpose ideally. This bloodbath decapitated – literally and figuratively the first ranks of Cuba’s Contras.
"Equally important, his massacre cowed and terrorized. These were all public trials. And the executions, right down to the final shattering of the skull with the coup de grace from a massive .45 slug fired at five paces, were public too. Guevara made it a policy for his men to parade the families and friends of the executed before the blood-, bone- and brain-spattered paredon (The Wall, and Pink Floyd had nothing to do with this one).
"The Red Terror had come to Cuba. 'We will make our hearts cruel, hard, and immovable ... we will not quiver at the sight of a sea of enemy blood. Without mercy, without sparing, we will kill our enemies in scores of thousands; let them drown themselves in their own blood! Let there be floods of the blood of the bourgeois – more blood, as much as possible.'”
Daniel Greenfield: The Nobel Peace Prize Jumps the Shark
"This is actually a brilliant misstep that was meant to honor Obama, but in reality humiliates him, because not even his defenders at home can point to anything he’s actually done to deserve the award.
"Had the Committee of Eccentric Left Wing Norwegians waited a bit and handed the award to Obama for pushing for Israeli concessions or some of his diplomatic roundtrips, it would have significantly burnished his image. Instead what they’ve done is turned both Obama and the Nobel Peace Prize into laughingstocks.
"When even the same unfailingly worshipful media is seriously questioning the award, it’s not a good sign. The Committee of Incontinent Peaceloving Norwegians has said that they wanted to “encourage” Obama, which is patronizing and condescending. And it gives the entirely accurate impression of the slow kid who’s given a trophy just for showing up.
"Domestically this award is a disaster for Obama. It’s something not even his closest media backers can claim he deserves. It’s not something even he can claim he deserves. It turns him into a joke. And even ABC is now running a list of Obama Nobel jokes.
"About the smartest thing Obama could do now would be to decline the award, but he isn’t likely to do it. The award gives him a forum, but not a whole lot less. Mostly it shows him up as being an empty chair and the Nobel Committee as being a bunch of dishonest agitators who have no interest in rewarding achievement, only in promoting agendas."
and
"And then there are the headlines,
Praise and skepticism greet Obama Nobel award - Reuters
Obama Peace Prize win has Americans asking why? - Reuters
Analysis: Obama’s Nobel honors promise, not action - AP
The Nobel Prize Committee May Have Done Obama More Harm Than Good - HuffPo
Nobel Reaction: The Turn-it-Down Trend - WSJ
Iraqis Question Merit of Peace-Prize - WSJ
Barack Obama’s Nobel prize greeted with cynicism and surprise - Guardian
A Nobel for a Good Two Weeks? - Washington Post
A Little Soon for the Nobel Peace Prize? - New York Times
Obama Peace Prize Win Draws Mixed Reaction - Voice of America"
"Had the Committee of Eccentric Left Wing Norwegians waited a bit and handed the award to Obama for pushing for Israeli concessions or some of his diplomatic roundtrips, it would have significantly burnished his image. Instead what they’ve done is turned both Obama and the Nobel Peace Prize into laughingstocks.
"When even the same unfailingly worshipful media is seriously questioning the award, it’s not a good sign. The Committee of Incontinent Peaceloving Norwegians has said that they wanted to “encourage” Obama, which is patronizing and condescending. And it gives the entirely accurate impression of the slow kid who’s given a trophy just for showing up.
"Domestically this award is a disaster for Obama. It’s something not even his closest media backers can claim he deserves. It’s not something even he can claim he deserves. It turns him into a joke. And even ABC is now running a list of Obama Nobel jokes.
"About the smartest thing Obama could do now would be to decline the award, but he isn’t likely to do it. The award gives him a forum, but not a whole lot less. Mostly it shows him up as being an empty chair and the Nobel Committee as being a bunch of dishonest agitators who have no interest in rewarding achievement, only in promoting agendas."
and
"And then there are the headlines,
Praise and skepticism greet Obama Nobel award - Reuters
Obama Peace Prize win has Americans asking why? - Reuters
Analysis: Obama’s Nobel honors promise, not action - AP
The Nobel Prize Committee May Have Done Obama More Harm Than Good - HuffPo
Nobel Reaction: The Turn-it-Down Trend - WSJ
Iraqis Question Merit of Peace-Prize - WSJ
Barack Obama’s Nobel prize greeted with cynicism and surprise - Guardian
A Nobel for a Good Two Weeks? - Washington Post
A Little Soon for the Nobel Peace Prize? - New York Times
Obama Peace Prize Win Draws Mixed Reaction - Voice of America"
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