The London Telegraph
April 4, 2009

Last October the House of Commons passed, by 463 votes to three, the most expensive piece of legislation ever put through Parliament. The only MP to question the cost of the Climate Change Act, requiring Britain to cut its CO2 emissions by 80 per cent within 40 years, was Peter Lilley. It was also Mr Lilley who, just before the MPs voted to stop runaway global warming, drew the House’s attention to the fact that, outside, London was experiencing its first October snow for 74 years.

March 16, 2009
American.com
by Charles Murray

America’s elites must once again fall in love with what makes the United States different.

The advent of the Obama administration brings this question before the nation: Do we want the United States to be like Europe? President Obama and his leading intellectual heroes are the American equivalent of Europe’s social democrats. There’s nothing sinister about that. They share an intellectually respectable view that Europe’s regulatory and social welfare systems are more progressive than America’s and advocate reforms that would make the American system more like the European system.

Not only are social democrats intellectually respectable, the European model has worked in many ways. I am delighted when I get a chance to go to Stockholm or Amsterdam, not to mention Rome or Paris. When I get there, the people don’t seem to be groaning under the yoke of an evil system. Quite the contrary. There’s a lot to like—a lot to love—about day-to-day life in Europe.

Iraq: Good News Is No News

By Charles Krauthammer
Washington Post
Friday, February 13, 2009; Page A17

Preoccupied as it was poring over Tom Daschle's tax returns, Washington hardly noticed a near-miracle abroad. Iraq held provincial elections. There was no Election Day violence. Security was handled by Iraqi forces with little U.S. involvement. A fabulous bazaar of 14,400 candidates representing 400 parties participated, yielding results highly favorable to both Iraq and the United States.

Iraq moved away from religious sectarianism toward more secular nationalism. "All the parties that had the words 'Islamic' or 'Arab' in their names lost," noted Middle East expert Amir Taheri. "By contrast, all those that had the words 'Iraq' or 'Iraqi' gained." 

Prime Minister Nouri al-Maliki went from leader of a small Islamic party to leader of the "State of Law Party," campaigning on security and secular nationalism. He won a smashing victory. His chief rival, a more sectarian and pro-Iranian Shiite religious party, was devastated. 

From last night's (2/9/09) first press conference with President Obama:

Obama: "The Federal government is the only entity left with the resources to get the economy going again."

*The federal government doesn't have the resources! It is going to borrow and print money in a futile attempt to create the "resources". This will make things even worse. And the Bureau of Labor Statistics says that government debt is not the solution. It was private sector job growth that got us out of the recessions of the late 70s and 80s. 

Obama: "You have some people, very sincere, who philosophically just think the govt has no business interfering in the marketplace. And in fact there are several who suggested that FDR was wrong to intervene in the New Deal. They're fighting battles that I thought were resolved a pretty long time ago."

*The Democratic "solution" is unfortunately based on something that was tired and failed nearly 80 years ago - in the 1930s! That Depression lasted 15 years. More recently, Reagan did the exact opposite in 1981 when he came into office with an even worse recession than the one we have now. He slashed government spending. Froze government programs and gave substantial tax breaks to businesses and workers. 

*The Democrats are doing the exact opposite. They're drastically increasing government spending and debt, while letting tax breaks expire (next year). This can only have the opposite result of Reagan's success in the 1980s. 

*The non-partisan Congressional Budget Office (CBO) says the spending package will actually lower GDP by .1 - .3 percent. "Do nothing" according to the CBO and it would result in less debt and higher growth. 

*Wall Street may not understand history, but it understands economics and the Dow plummeted more than 4.5% today (nearly 400 points) after Obama detailed his economic plan in a press conference last night. They are wholly underwhelmed. 

OBAMA: "Most economists almost unanimously recognize... that government is an important element of introducing some additional demand into the economy."

Fascist Ecology:
The "Green Wing" of the Nazi Party and its Historical Antecedents

From:  Spunk.org

Peter Staudenmaier

"We recognize that separating humanity from nature, from the whole of life, leads to humankind’s own destruction and to the death of nations. Only through a re-integration of humanity into the whole of nature can our people be made stronger. That is the fundamental point of the biological tasks of our age. Humankind alone is no longer the focus of thought, but rather life as a whole . . . This striving toward connectedness with the totality of life, with nature itself, a nature into which we are born, this is the deepest meaning and the true essence of National Socialist thought." ¹

In our zeal to condemn the status quo, radicals often carelessly toss about epithets like "fascist" and "ecofascist," thus contributing to a sort of conceptual inflation that in no way furthers effective social critique. In such a situation, it is easy to overlook the fact that there are still virulent strains of fascism in our political culture which, however marginal, demand our attention. One of the least recognized or understood of these strains is the phenomenon one might call "actually existing ecofascism," that is, the preoccupation of authentically fascist movements with environmentalist concerns. In order to grasp the peculiar intensity and endurance of this affiliation, we would do well to examine more closely its most notorious historical incarnation, the so-called "green wing" of German National Socialism.

There are just two questions that Barack Obama won't answer in the scandal involving Illinois governor Rod Blagojevich's attempt to sell Obama's now-empty Senate seat to the highest "bidder".

1. In light of the incredible corruption of Illinois politics, do you favor a special election to fill your Senate seat?  That way the people of Illinois can choose your successor and the winner will avoid the taint of scandal.
2.  You said in a recent press conference that your office had minimal contact with the Governor, yet court papers show your Chief of Staff had 21 phone conversations with him.  How is it that 21 separate contacts constitutes "minimal" contacts in your opinion, Sir?  

On December 16th a reporter tried to ask Obama these questions and was immediately cut off by Obama as he followed the old-style political habit of squelching the airing of opposing views.  Obama would not even let him ask the question.  Obama's response, "John, John... let me, let me, let me just cut you off - because I don't want you to waste your question."  "The facts are going to be released next week, it would be inappropriate for me to comment."

He brilliantly cuts the reporter off just in time to keep him from actually re-stating the charges that would impugn the Obama team with possible corruption - while telling the reporter he's doing him a favor by not letting him "waste his question"!  Very much old-style politics there.  So much for "transparency" in government. 

The Disturbing Press Conference Audio

That is a stunning answer given Obama's campaign rhetoric about change.  This represents no change.  This is how scandals are typically handled by corrupt and guilty politicians. 

We have not written about this scandal here because until now we saw no evidence that Obama or his transition team had any involvement in it.  However, the special prosecutor, Patrick Fitzgerald has released information indicating that Obama's new Chief of Staff, Rahm Emmanuel has spoken to the corrupt Illinois governor 21 times since Obama's election (just a month and a half ago) about his eventual successor in the Senate.  This is a stunning revelation in light of Obama's statement last week that his office had had "minimal contact" with the Governor.  And it is the first evidence that has made us look up and take notice.

Let's look quickly at how Obama's response two days ago goes against what he promised in his campaign.  He promised first, "change".  He was clever enough never to specify exactly what kind of change he meant, but he purposely left everyone believing that he meant change for the better.  During the campaign he talked about how important it would be for the people's voices to be heard.  He emphasized how important "openness" and  "transparency" in government would be under his administration.  Yet his response two days ago goes against all that and reflects nothing more than politics as usual.  

The Real Obama
A Centrist? No. A Transformer

By Charles Krauthammer
Washington Post
Friday, December 12, 2008; Page A27

As Obama revealingly said just last week, "This painful crisis also provides us with an opportunity to transform our economy to improve the lives of ordinary people." Transformation is his mission. Crisis provides the opportunity. The election provides him the power.

The job of Obama's economic and security appointees is to keep credit flowing and the world at bay so that Obama can address his real ambition: to effect a domestic transformation as grand and ambitious as Franklin Roosevelt's.

Barack Obama has garnered praise from center to right -- and has highly irritated the left -- with the centrism of his major appointments. Because Obama's own beliefs remain largely opaque, his appointments have led to the conclusion that he intends to govern from the center.

Obama the centrist? I'm not so sure. Take the foreign policy team: Hillary Clinton, James Jones and Bush holdover Robert Gates. As centrist as you can get. But the choice was far less ideological than practical. Obama has no intention of being a foreign policy president. Unlike, say, Nixon or Reagan, he does not have aspirations abroad. He simply wants quiet on his eastern and western fronts so that he can proceed with what he really cares about -- his domestic agenda.

Similarly his senior economic team, the brilliant trio of Tim Geithner, Larry Summers and Paul Volcker: centrist, experienced and mainstream. But their principal task is to stabilize the financial system, a highly pragmatic task in which Obama has no particular ideological stake.

A functioning financial system is a necessary condition for a successful Obama presidency. As in foreign policy, Obama wants experts and veterans to manage and pacify universes in which he has little experience and less personal commitment. Their job is to keep credit flowing and the world at bay so that Obama can address his real ambition: to effect a domestic transformation as grand and ambitious as Franklin Roosevelt's.