Celebrating 9/11
New Hampshire primary results: Romney cruises to victory
Excerpt: Former Massachusetts governor Mitt Romney cruised, as expected, to an easy victory in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary, going two for two in the nominating contests thus far and reinforcing his standing as the man to beat for the 2012 Republican presidential nomination. The race moves south to what promises to be a brutal fight in South Carolina, where, if Romney prevails in the third contest in a row on Jan. 21, he might be all but unstoppable for the nomination. (I’m trying to get used to the idea that my favorite candidate for President—Anybody But Obama—may have the first name Mitt. ~Bob.)
New Hampshire shows Romney’s broad appeal and his opponents’ limited bases of support
Excerpt: The results in Tuesday’s New Hampshire primary confirmed many of our suspicions about the GOP presidential field. Specifically, the exit polls showed that Mitt Romney is the pick of pragmatists who want to beat President Obama and that everybody else in the field has a very defined base of support that calls into question any chance they may have of winning the GOP nomination.
Romney goes for the knockout punch in South Carolina primary
Excerpt: Mitt Romney is going for the kill in South Carolina.
The Jan. 21 primary could crown Mitt Romney as the Republican nominee, making the former Massachusetts governor three for three in the early states. Polls have Romney leading South Carolina by double digits, and no other candidate has his campaign cash, organization and political momentum. History in the South Carolina GOP primary is clear: The winner always nabs the nomination. (Most Republicans would prefer someone else. But the supporters of all alternatives trashed all the other alternatives, leaving Romney standing. ~Bob.)
Video: Romney’s victory speech
Excerpt: Romney was the tea-party candidate, and not by a narrow margin either. (Fifty-one percent of voters called themselves TP supporters; among that group, Romney beat Paul by 18 points.) He also won Republicans by more than 30 points and finished a close second to Paul among independents. The only demographic in which he got crushed was Democrats. The leader in that group: Huntsman, of course, with 41 percent.
Exposing Romney's Fatal Flaw: How Conservatives Can Still Win
Excerpt: The biggest threat to conservatives opposed to Mitt Romney right now is not anything that's happening in the debates, or on the ground. It's the narrative that the primary is, or soon will be over and Romney has everything locked up. He doesn't and the longer this thing goes on, the weaker he gets.
The Bain Capital Bonfire
Excerpt: About the best that can be said about the Republican attacks on Mitt Romney's record at Bain Capital is that President Obama is going to do the same thing eventually, so GOP primary voters might as well know what's coming. Yet that hardly absolves Newt Gingrich, Rick Perry and others for their crude and damaging caricatures of modern business and capitalism. Bain's business model is little more than "rich people figuring out clever legal ways to loot a company," says Mr. Gingrich, whose previous insights into free enterprise include years of defending the taxpayer-fed business of corn ethanol.
Right-wing rips Gingrich, Perry for attacks on Romney, capitalism
Excerpt: Yet in slamming Romney as a corporate raider, the two candidates fighting for their party’s right-wing may have done what Romney never seemed capable of: rallying conservatives around the former Massachusetts governor's campaign.
Never has a winner looked so beaten By John Podhoretz
Excerpt: But Republicans will vote for Romney in the primaries. Voters tend to take their responsibility seriously, and they want to vote for someone who is a serious candidate. And because every other plausible major candidate refused to run in 2011, Romney has been the only serious candidate in the race. But nobody loves him. No one is inspired by him. He cuts an impressive figure and is clearly very intelligent, but he is a man without an ideological core.
2 veteran Calif. GOP congressmen announce retirement
Excerpt: Two veteran California congressmen announced their retirements in recent days as the fallout from the state’s new redistricting process continues to rattle the nation’s largest congressional delegation.
Iran plans one-kiloton underground nuclear test in 2012
Excerpt: According to debkafile's Iranian sources, Tehran is preparing an underground test of a one-kiloton nuclear device during 2012, much like the test carried out by North Korea in 2006. Underground facilities are under construction in great secrecy behind the noise and fury raised by the start of advanced uranium enrichment at Iran's fortified, subterranean Fordo site near Qom. (Get ready for some sky high oil prices, severe world competition for what is available and, worse than anything, a world-wide economic slowdown accompanied by civil unrest throughout the globe...that is, if the attack comes in the next two months or so...odds are good that both the United States and Israel will do so if the Persians test the weapon and close the strait. –WB)
A Fabian Socialist Dream Come True: The gradual revolution of the Fabian Socialists is quickly becoming a reality in America.
Excerpt: The Fabian Society began in England in 1887 by a very small group of elitist socialist that sought to reform society gradually into one of socialism instead of through violent revolution. At first their purpose was to be an alternative in Britain for the more dominate Marxist Social-Democratic Federation, but their true goal was to accomplish socialism through a very gradual process using the voting booth and representative democracy as their instrument of change. In fact, one of their symbols is a Turtle with the motto: "When I Strike, I Strike Hard". Another symbol is the Wolf in Sheep's Clothing and the Globe on an Anvil being hammered into the Fabian model.
Newt SC anti-Romney ad on abortion
Greece Declares Pedophilia A Disability
Excerpt: The Greek government is being denounced by the National Confederation of Disabled People after it added pedophiles, exhibitionists, and kleptomaniacs to the list of disabled people entitled to state benefits. (Update: Their inclusion on the list will not be used to provide benefits. Yet.) They have joined pyromaniacs, compulsive gamblers, fetishists and sadomasochists as persons entitled to ask for government assistance. (When you destroy individual responsibility in favor of the state, everyone is a victim, entitled to live at someone’s expense. ~Bob.)
Excerpts: One of the ways Massachusetts officials have tried to temper RomneyCare’s cost overruns was by denying participation to legal immigrants. Last week, the Commonwealth’s highest court ruled that restriction violates the Massachusetts Constitution:
Occupy Baltimore members gather to fight foreclosure By Yvonne Wenger
Excerpt: Occupy Baltimore protesters set a new scene Tuesday for their stand against corporate greed and social injustice: a red-brick rowhouse in Union Square where a 65-year-old widow has made her home for nearly six years. As many as 100 protesters gathered outside Lila Kara's house, where faded American flags occupy a curbside flower bed, to block the Baltimore City Sheriff's Office from evicting the Bolivian immigrant — at least for a day. (Good news. Everyone stop paying your mortgage and the Occupy twits will keep you in your home. ~Bob.)
Convention Wisdom
Excerpt: For two decades, American cities have used public dollars to build convention center space beyond what demand warranted. The result has been a gigantic nationwide surplus of empty meeting facilities, struggling convention centers and vacant hotel rooms. Given the glut, you'd think that cities would stop. Instead, many are spending hundreds of millions of dollars to expand convention centers and open yet more dazzling hotels, arguing that whatever convention business remains will flow to the places with the fanciest amenities. If this dubious rationale proves wrong and the facilities fail, the only result will be that taxpayers will wind up on the hook, as usual, says Steven Malagna, a senior fellow at the Manhattan Institute.
Worth Reading: Blowing Bubbles: Getting Ready for the Next Bust
Excerpt: Over the course of several decades politicians—both Democrat and Republican—encouraged banks and mortgage companies to ease lending standards in hopes of making housing more affordable for the poor. They also urged the government-sponsored enterprises (GSEs) Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae (the Federal Home Loan Mortgage Corporation and the Federal National Mortgage Association) to purchase the resulting low-quality loans from lending institutions. This freed up money, enabling banks to make more loans than would have otherwise been possible. These actions, along with low short-term interest rates set by the Federal Reserve and tax advantages for home buyers, sparked a housing boom. Home prices soared and investors flocked to purchase mortgage-backed derivatives. Speculation became rampant, and houses were bought simply to resell, or “flip,” when prices rose. Eventually, the bubble burst. (Excellent, clear explanation of what created the fiscal mess we are in—or at least part of it. This is part of the vote-buying by both parties that has put us on the road to fiscal collapse, followed by political and social collapse. But politicians cannot admit that upward mobility requires long cultural and educational change. You cannot legislate the poor into a middle class lifestyle any more than you can legislate me into the life style enjoyed by Soros, Gates, Buffet, Kerry and the Obamas. OWS cannot understand why they cannot live like CEOs with a 20 hour a week job and a degree in Peace Studies. People without a high school diploma, and limited skills, work ethic and experience cannot understand why they can’t have a house like an MBA making six figures. They all expect the government to fix that for them, and will vote for politicians who promise the impossible. ~Bob.)
Doctors Say Obamacare Is No Remedy for U.S. Health Woes
Excerpt: America’s doctors have conducted a full examination of the president’s health reform law — and their diagnosis of its effects on our healthcare system isn’t good.
Nearly two-thirds of doctors expect the quality of care in this country to decline, according to a new survey from consulting giant Deloitte. Just 27 percent think that the law will lower costs. And nearly seven of every 10 doctors believe that medicine is no longer attractive to America’s “best and brightest.”
Terrorists Kill Commerce Deputy of Iran's Nuclear Enrichment Site
Excerpt: An Iranian university professor and deputy director at Natanz enrichment facility was killed in a terrorist bomb blast in a Northern Tehran neighborhood on Wednesday morning. The magnetic bomb which was planted by an unknown motorcyclist under the car of Mostafa Ahmadi Roshan Behdast, a professor at Tehran's technical university, also wounded two other Iranian nationals in Seyed Khandan neighborhood in Northern Tehran. (Another death that may save tens of thousands of American—or Israeli—lives. ~Bob.)
Would we not have killed anyone necessary to stop Nazi Germany from getting an A-Bomb? Terrorism is when you kill innocent folks to make a political point. Anyone creating nuclear weapons for terrorist states is not innocent. This is not terrorism, it is surgery to save thousands of innocent lives. ~Bob.
Excerpt: The latest proposal to reform Medicare is a bipartisan gesture, courtesy of Senator Ron Wyden of Oregon, a Democrat with a long record of reaching across the aisle on health care, and Paul Ryan, Republican of Wisconsin and chairman of the House Budget Committee. The basic idea is to give seniors “premium support,” a risk-adjusted voucher that can be applied to the premiums charged by competing private sector health plans. In this version, Medicare would be one of the plans seniors could apply their voucher to. The Ryan/Wyden proposal would cap the rate of growth of premium support at the real rate of growth of per capita GDP plus 1%, even though health care spending overall has been growing at about GDP plus 2% for the past four decades. In this respect, the proposal is similar to the Ryan/Rivlin proposal, the Dominici/Rivlin proposal, and the Bowles/Simpson (Obama debt commission) proposal.
Federal court blocks Oklahoma ban on Sharia law
Excerpt: An amendment that would ban Oklahoma courts from considering international or Islamic law discriminates against religions and a Muslim community leader has the right to challenge its constitutionality, a federal appeals court said Tuesday. (Hard for me to see how a court could be allowed to consider any law except the law passed by the legislative bodies for that jurisdiction. Should, for example, a Bulgarian be allowed to bring in Bulgarian law when charged with a crime under Oklahoma law? It might help if these idiot judges had to live under Shari’a for a bit. ~Bob.)
POLL: Do you approve of the job Gov. Walker is doing?
A correspondent sent me this. I forwarded, then another pointed out that it is old. But it can’t hurt to vote. ~Bob.
Tim Tebow and being all American
Excerpt: There is absolutely no doubt Tim Tebow has become an American phenomenon. A new word has entered the American lexicon, “Tebowing” which described a public prayer or giving thanks to God. Why has America become so fascinated with Tim Tebow? Tim Tebow is a throwback to a better time. If you want to describe Tim Tebow, All American pretty much sums it up. Tim Tebow represents all of the qualities we used to look for in America’s young men. (This is what I have said. On my part, I grew up through the 40's and 50's. Most men were like Tebow. They were religious, and a lot them had gone through WWII and/or Korea. There were few cops because there were very few criminals. –DH)
Testimony: DEA agents posing as pilots flew cocaine shipment through Dallas airport
Excerpt: US agents helped launder millions in drug proceeds 09 Jan 2012 Mexico's government allowed a group of undercover U.S. anti-drug agents and their Colombian informant to launder millions in cash for a powerful Mexican drug trafficker and his Colombian cocaine supplier, according to documents made public Monday. The Mexican magazine Emeequis published portions of documents that describe how Drug Enforcement Administration agents, a Colombian trafficker-turned-informant and Mexican federal police officers in 2007 infiltrated the Beltran Leyva drug cartel and a cell of money launderers for Colombia 's Valle del Norte cartel in Mexico ... In his testimony, the DEA agent in charge of the operation says DEA agents posing as pilots flew at least one shipment of cocaine from Ecuador to Madrid through a Dallas airport. (This administration is losing the power to shock. ~Bob.)
Worth Reading: In Greed I Trust By Walter E. Williams
Excerpt: Think about greed and racial discrimination. In 1947, when the Brooklyn Dodgers hired Jackie Robinson, why did racial discrimination by major league teams begin to drop like a hot potato? It wasn't feelings of guilt by white owners, affirmative action or anti-discrimination laws. It turned out that there was a huge pool of black baseball talent in the Negro leagues. It became too costly for teams to allow the Dodgers to gain a monopoly on this talent. Black players won the National League's Most Valuable Player award for seven consecutive seasons. Had other teams not stepped in to hire black players, allowing the Dodgers to hire them, it might have given the Dodgers a virtual monopoly on world championships.
Class Warfare and the Buffett Rule: Implementing a surtax on 'millionaires' would hurt just about everyone but the super rich like Warren Buffett. By Arthur B. Laffer
Excerpt: The political season has barely begun, and yet we already know that class warfare will be President Obama's key issue in the 2012 general election. It's even reared its ugly head in the Republican primaries, with the candidates trying to paint front-runner Mitt Romney as a cold-hearted capitalist and Rick Santorum proposing targeted tax breaks for the "working class" manufacturing sector.
Very Interesting: Exit the moderates . . . and weep for the economy By Charles Gasparino
Very Interesting: Exit the moderates . . . and weep for the economy By Charles Gasparino
Excerpt: The announcement that Bill Daley will step down as President Obama’s chief of staff is further proof that as the 2012 election approaches, Obama is embracing his inner leftist on anything touching the economy. The administration has moved so far left that even one of the country’s most prominent Democrats can’t fit in. Embracing Wall Street protesters, massive government programs and tax hikes might seem like a losing formula for re-election, but Team Obama is betting it’s the best way — maybe the only way — to win.
Excerpt: The Illinois budgetary record is not pretty. Heading into 2011, Illinois faced a budget deficit of over $13 billion and passed a massive tax increase both to personal income and corporate income tax rates. They’re still broke. With a pension system in shambles, Illinois also borrowed massive amounts of money to make this year’s pension payment. In September, Illinois laid off 1,900 public employees and closed seven state facilities. Also, much to the chagrin of Wisconsinites who drive to or through Illinois, toll rates in the state have increased on average by 88%. Illinois’ budgetary moves failed miserably to solve their problems and the state is still projected to end this fiscal year on June 30th with a budget gap upwards of half a billion dollars and unfunded obligations of up to $8 billion. As a result, this past week, Moody’s lowered Illinois’ credit rating, giving the Prairie State the lowest rating of any state in the nation.
Today in History: Jan. 10, 1967
Massachusetts Republican Edward Brooke takes office as the first African-American ever to be popularly elected to the U.S. Senate. Brooke, a Howard University graduate who earned a Bronze Star in World War II fighting in a segregated unit, would serve two terms in the Senate, where he was a leading proponent of affordable housing and became ranking member of the powerful Senate Banking Committee. He remains the only African-American to be reelected to the upper chamber of Congress.
Union “Dues for Dems” Facing Supreme Court Challenge
Excerpt: Though not receiving nearly as much attention as other impending Supreme Court rulings, there is now a case before the court that may prove debilitating to the long-enjoyed election funds bounty given to the Democratic Party from its Big Labor supporters.
Bill Daley Ordered Investigation Into Obama Green Energy Loans – Two Months Later He’s Gone…
Excerpt: An interesting tidbit found within the various media reports regarding former White House Chief of Staff Bill Daley’s rather sudden departure from the Obama White House – just two months earlier Daley had ordered a comprehensive review of all Department of Energy loan guarantees following the Solyndra scandal. Coincidence?
The Narrative of Perpetual Palestinian Victimhood by Shelby Steele
Excerpt: The Arab-Israeli conflict, is not really a conflict, it is a war – a war of the Arabs against the Jews. In many ways, this conflict has been a conflict between narratives. We who strongly support Israel have done a poor job in formulating a narrative which will combat the story spun by the other side. We can do better. (Jew hatred is certainly mixed in with the Palestinians' "eternal" victimhood (ironic, since Palestinian Arabs only invented themselves as distinct from Arabs or southern Syrians some 40 years ago). But there is a more generalized explanation for cultural martyrdom. The universal root of this sense of victimhood is the cardinal sin of envy. Envy is not only the resentment of what the other has and the wish to take it from him and even kill him. Envy is also the rationalization that what the other has must come at one's own expense. The underlying culture of envy (or the behavior, in the case of the individual) is self-loathing that sometimes expresses itself as justification for suicide. Shelby Steele, who has no horse in this game, has hit the mark. Cordially, Larry Greenberg. Maybe this is why leftists support the Islamist murderers—they preach envy here at home as a policy and electoral tool. ~Bob.)
An Army officer sums up what makes Marines different
Excerpt: In the Marines, everyone–sergeant, mechanic, cannoneer, supply man, clerk, aviator, cook–is a rifleman first. The entire Corps, all 170,000 or so on the active rolls, plus the reserves, are all infantry. All speak the language of the rifle and bayonet, of muddy boots and long, hot marches. It’s never us and them, only us. That is the secret of the Corps.
Dead People Receive Ballots in NH Primary
Nothing wrong with this, just ask AG Holder. ~Bob.
TransCanada details Keystone XL’s job-creating potential
Excerpt: TransCanada Corp. has released a detailed job breakdown for the Keystone XL pipeline and said it will create 13,000 construction employment opportunities and 7,000 in manufacturing for Americans. The company has provided the job breakdown in response to critics who argue that the company’s job creation estimates for the project are too high and will only lead to ‘a few hundred’ temporary jobs. But the company has shot back with a detailed account of employment potential in the United States, right down to the number of oilers, labourers and welders needed for the US$7-billion project. (“We Can’t Wait” for jobs, Mr. President. ~Bob.)
Obama’s Postmodern Vision: Will we have another four years of his selective reading of the law? By Victor Davis Hanson
Excerpt: There has been for months a popular parlor game of tallying instances in which President Obama seems to have either ignored or simply bypassed federal law. But what started out as a way of exposing occasional hypocrisy is now getting a little scary.
Excerpt: I know we’re all supposed to think that the primaries are poised to turn out a weak Republican nominee and that President Obama will swoop in this fall and carry the day with some brilliant pincer move that simultaneously dubs the Republican too extreme, too moderate, too boring, and too weird. And I suppose it’s possible that the president and his team will suddenly turn out to possess keen political skills they have been hiding somewhere for the past three years. But can we spend a moment pondering the approach that team Obama seems to be hatching so far?
DMV: 900 Dead People May Have Voted
Must be a lie. The Democrats assured us this was not a problem, that while you need an ID to buy booze, a gun, spray paint or Draino (in IL), you can vote whenever and as often as you want with no ID. ~Bob. Excerpt: The director of South Carolina's Department of Motor Vehicles has told the State Law Enforcement Division that more than 900 people who were recorded as having voted were actually dead. DMV Director Kevin Shwedo told legislators about the issue Wednesday as the U.S. Justice Department questions a new state law requiring people to show photographic identification when they vote in person.
Event more for media than CEOs?
Excerpt: Dozens of journalists packed into the East Room at the White House today for the president's remarks on "in-sourcing," at least 60 of them lining the press risers and walls. But what many couldn't see in press coverage of the event — held with roughly 120 executives to discuss bringing jobs back to America from overseas — were the dozens of empty seats in the audience. (Maybe they didn’t want to be props for a business and job-killing administration’s reelection campaign. ~Bob.)
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Robert A. Hall
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