Hillary is Toast While Obama Jams!

John Bolton keeps making sense while the Administration dithers. Hesitancy to retaliate against Iran is mainly because the State Department's fears doing so will turn pro-American Iranians into an anti posture and they will have to defend the Mullahs. Iranians will rally round the flag and things will only worsen is the State Department bottom line argument. Far too many State Department Diplomats prefer paralysis to action. (See 1 below.)

More Iranian intrusions in Lebanon's internal affairs. (See 2 below.)

A brief bio on Mrs. John McCain. Contrast with Michelle Obama. (See 3 below.)

During a political campaign a lot of nonsense spews from the lips of those seeking office. Pandering is a political art form. The following seem to be new whipping boys and over the hill assertions:

Greedy energy companies are why we have high oil prices.

First, oil is denominated in dollars so producers offset the plunging dollar by raising prices. Second, demand for oil is growing as emerging nations increase their thirst. Third, "greens" have leaned on liberals to vote against domestic drilling in regions where known oil deposits exist, NIMBY's have prevented refineries from being built as well as atomic energy plants.

GW caved on Social Security.

The problem with Social Security is because the "tax" is taken out of salaries. No one writes a check for it. Subtle, but an effectively silent, way to raise revenue. This revenue is considered a general source and is spent. Government IOU's are issued in return. There is no "lock box" as former Sen. Gore would have you believe. Thus, receipts from the SS tax have helped fund excessive Congressional spending.
The Social Security system was designed to supplement retirement not become a convenient tree on which pandering politicians would hang an endless list of Christmas baubles.


Immigration takes jobs away. By the year 2020 we will have two employed paying into the system to support each retired recipient withdrawing from the system. We will be running out of workers in the next 20 or so years. The 12 or so million illegals also do not pay into the Social Security system yet, are meeting work force needs. We should either enforce our current immigration policy, which would force change, or we should scrap our current immigration policy and allow anyone who wants to, come to America assuming no criminal or health issues are involved.

No politician will touch either SS or immigration because they will be electrocuted rather than re-elected. (See 4 below.)

Raising taxes will solve our fiscal problems and create equity. Lower taxes actually increases economic activity which, in turn, results in more tax revenues. What should be done is reduce spending. This will not happen because virtually everyone has some vested interest in government largess. Politicians get re-elected by building constituencies who vote for them. If you want more of something spend money on it.

Taxing the rich is Populistic Pap. The rich can maneuver because they have spending options.

NAFTA is the cause of unemployment in Indiana and elsewhere. Unions have priced worker costs beyond what is supportable where labor is a large cost component. Thus, it is impossible to compete with labor costs in emerging countries. American workers need to be retrained for other work where the product or service's value can absorb high labor costs, ie bio-technology or other such esoteric endeavors where worker productivity can be leveraged. Politicians obfuscate and fear straight talk. The public is emotional and gullible.

Withdrawing from Iraq will make us and the Middle East safer. No, it will simply allow radical Islamists to expand their influence and bring more oil resources under their sway. That is not to say we must remain in Iraq forever. We must stay the course and train a reliable Iraqi force to protect their own people. In time, the Sunnis and Shia will pursue peace rather than each other. We are now doing this with some modest results.

But when it comes to Iran all candidates boast about what they would do should Iran attack Israel not because they will but because it plays to Israeli sympathizers. Hillary seeks to prove she would become a Patton like Commander in Chief. Obama has no clue because he believes you can negotiate with thugs who interpret such acts as signs of weakness. McCain is the only candidate with real war experience and he is saying little.(See 5 below.)

GTW is to blame for every problem. Democrats have been running the government for the last several years. They control both The House and Senate but have accomplished nothing of note. They are on track to increase their numbers and when they control a veto proof Congress and they will spend with abandon. They have opposed any spending control mechanisms to date. In time they will fall on their swords and the Republicans will return and so it goes. (See 6 below.)

These are but a few of the false assertions being bantered about during the current campaign. It is all fun and games and nothing will change regardless of who becomes president because government is too big, too intrusive, runs on automatic pilot and has no profit incentives driving it. Bureaucratic agencies are funded whether they accomplish anything worthwhile or not and incoming administrations have little leverage over their effectiveness.

Every day you read reports about this or that agency failing to follow up on reforms Congress mandated so some bureau head is relieved after more Congressional oversight hearings and nothing changes. This week we are learning how the FAA and FDA have failed to correct air and food safety problems. Last month it was the SEC and the Federal Reserve regarding home mortgages and securitization. Next week it will be some other agency.

Employment is down but not in the public sector.

Olmert's gag order to be partially lifted. Now all can gag over his grief. (See 7 below.)

Hillary is toast while Obama jams! (See 8 below.)

Dick


1)Bolton: US air strikes on Iran would be major step towards Iraq victory

Former American UN ambassador John Bolton said that while a hostile Iranian response harming US interests existed, the damaged inflicted by Tehran would be far higher if Washington took no action. He was quoted by the UK Telegraph as urging therefore that Washington order air strikes against the Revolutionary Guards Corps camps training Iraqi insurgents.

A US spokesman last week confirmed earlier disclosure that the IRGC’s al Qods Brigades had drafted Hizballah personnel to support Iraq’s Shiite militias and train them at facilities in Iran.



2)Explosive situation in Lebanon as government confronts Hizballah



Lebanon’s pro-Western Siniora government has declared illegal Hizballah’s private telecommunications network installed in southern and eastern Lebanon and the southern Shiite suburbs of Beirut. It was reported some weeks ago the network is military and was installed by Iran to prepare its Lebanese proxy for war with Israel.

The government, after a marathon session Tuesday, May 6, also approved a wage hike and cancel customs on food staples to break up the opposition-led labor union protests starting Wednesday.

Beirut airport security chief Brig. Gen. Wafiq Shqeir, a suspected pro-Hizballah sympathizer was removed for permitting the installation of spy cameras alleged by the government to “monitor the arrival of Lebanese and foreign leaders, to kidnap or assassinate people on the airport road.”

Trouble is expected Wednesday when the pro-Hizballah protesters start marching along a route which runs their traditional strongholds of the ruling March 14 majority alliance led by Saad Hariri and Walid Jumblatt’s Progressive Socialist Party.

Several unions say they will be boycotting the Hizballah-led protests and demonstrations.

Lebanon’s political crisis has left the country without a president since November 2007since when pro-Syrian factions have frustrated 18 attempts by parliament to elect a head of state.

3)Subject: Cindy McCain


There was an article in the Wall Street Journal on Cindy McCain, John's wife. This is a summary of the article:

She graduated from Southern Cal and was a special-needs teacher.

After her Dad died she became involved with his beer distributing firm and is now the chairwoman. Sales have doubled since she has taken over from her father.

They have a marriage prenuptial agreement, her assets remain separate.

She is involved around the world clearing land mines - travels to these countries on a detonation team and service on their board.

They have a 19 year old serving in Iraq , another son in the Naval Academy , a daughter recently graduated from Columbia Univ. , an adopted daughter in high school, and a son who is the finance guy at the beer firm.

Raised kids in Phoenix, Az. rather than Washington DC.(better atmosphere) He commuted.

In 1991,

Mrs. McCain came across a girl in an orphanage in Bangladesh . Mother Teresa implored Mrs. McCain to take the baby with severe cleft palate. She did so without first telling her husband. The couple adopted the girl who has had a dozen operations to repair her cleft palate and other medical problems.

They have a Family Foundation for children's causes.

She's active with "Halo Trust" - to clear land mines, provide water and food in war ravaged and developing countries.

She will join an overseas mission of "Operation Smile", a charity for corrective surgery on children's faces.

She has had two back surgeries and became addicted to pain killers. She talks openly about it which she says is part of the recovery process.

4) Immigrants Over 65

Immigrants 65 or older can now apply for SSI and Medicaid and get more
than a U.S. citizen born in the 1920s. For example, a typical
American born in 1924 with a median income who worked from 1944 to
2004 receives only $791 a month. Incredibly, the federal government
provides a single refugee with a monthly allowance of $1,890. In
addition, each immigrant can obtain $580 in social assistance for a
total of $2,470 a month. This contrasts to a single American taxpayer
who, after contributing to the growth and development of this country
for 40-50 years, receives a monthly maximum of $1,012 in old-age
pension and Guaranteed Income Supplement. Maybe U.S. citizens who
have paid into the social security fund over a lifetime should apply
as refugees!

Does anyone have any doubt why our social security fund will be
running out of money soon?

Source: Neal Report

5) Hillary Clinton's right to say 'obliterate'
By Michael Rubin

On April 29, answering a question on ABC's "Good Morning America," Sen. Hillary Clinton warned that if Iran attacked Israel with nuclear weapons, "we would be able to totally obliterate them." On NBC's "Meet the Press" Sunday, Sen. Barack Obama chided Clinton. "It's language reflective of George Bush. ...This kind of language is not helpful," Obama told Tim Russert.

If peace and stability are Obama's goals, one only needs to read the Iranian newspapers to see that he is dead wrong. On Sunday, the economic daily Donya-e Eqtesad declared the most recent diplomatic initiative - a package of incentives offered by the United States, Britain, France, Russia, China and Germany - to be a validation of Iranian defiance. Then, the next day, Kayhan, the daily newspaper that is the mouthpiece of the Supreme Leader, ridiculed international diplomats' offers of incentives to Iran if it stops its nuclear enrichment, chiding them "for mistaking Iran today with Iran four years ago" and noting that "Iran's bargaining position has strengthened considerably" since it began to accelerate its enrichment.

Obama must confront reality: While everyone wishes for diplomacy's success, it is Iran's nuclear advance, not American "saber-rattling," that is the single greatest danger to international peace and security.

The civilian nature of Iran's nuclear program is fiction. First, there is original sin: Iran experimented with warhead design until 2003. It spent millions to conceal its enrichment capability. It rests on a sea of oil and gas, giving it almost limitless generating capability for a fraction of its nuclear investment. Most damning, Iran does not possess the uranium resources to power its reactors beyond 2023.

Iran's Foreign Ministry officials - basically out-of-the-loop minders for Western diplomats and journalists - deny military ambitions. But those closer to Iran's leadership tell a very different story. On Dec. 14, 2001, then-President Hashemi Rafsanjani raised the possibility that, because Iran has the size to withstand a nuclear response, a nuclear first strike on Israel might be worthwhile.

On May 29, 2005, Hojjat ol-Islam Gholam Reza Hasani, the Supreme Leader's representative in West Azerbaijan, declared possession of nuclear weapons to be one of Iran's top goals. "An atom bomb ...must be produced as well," he said. While University of Michigan Prof. Juan Cole has made acottage industry of denying that Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said he wished to wipe Israel off the face of the map, the president's official translation affirmed his genocidal intent, as did the missiles paraded through Tehran with banners calling for Israel's demise.

The next U.S. President will confront a very different Iran from that faced by George Bush. That Obama - while not taking military options off the table entirely - seems bent on relying primarily on inspections and negotiations shows ignorance and inexperience.

The International Atomic Energy Agency inspects only Iran's declared facilities. It does so once a month. But if Iran has installed 6,000 centrifuges as Ahmadinejad has claimed, the Islamic Republic could produce a bomb's worth of highly enriched uranium in a matter of weeks.

If Iran goes nuclear, no amount of diplomacy will put the nuclear genie back in the bottle. And while most Iranians are peaceful, they do not control the country's nuclear program; the Supreme Leader and the Revolutionary Guards - the most ideological and reactionary faction within the Islamic Republic - do.

And so, in the face of a saber-rattling Iran, the next U.S. President will have just two main policy options: containment and deterrence. Both are military strategies. Containment requires alliances with regional states, forward deployment and, yes, permanent bases. Deterrence requires all Iranians to understand the collective responsibility that accompanies any use of nuclear weapons.

Clarifying red lines and consequences is not warmongering; it is responsible diplomacy.


6) Union Rules
By David Weigel

The Democratic coalition rubs its hands at the prospect of taking over Washington.



If you ever want a window into the needs and desires of the labor movement, you should listen to Stewart Acuff. And if you get within 50 yards of Acuff, you’ll be listening: The snow-bearded activist, now the AFL-CIO’s director of organizing, projects his voice like an opera singer. He grips the podium, white-knuckled. He clasps his hands, then pulls them apart with a snap. When I saw him at the Take Back America conference in Washington in March, his reedy voice grew rougher and louder as his speech went on.

“My brothers and sisters,” he said, “if we go into 2008 with an even larger mobilization of workers behind this legislation, with even more commitment to win the election in 2008, and put this on the agenda in 2009, I’m here to tell you today that we will pass this legislation, in the House, overwhelmingly! We will pass it in the Senate! We will defeat a Republican filibuster! And we will have a president who signs the Employee Free Choice Act! And we can get back to the business of restoring the American dream for millions and millions of workers!”

What’s the Employee Free Choice Act? If you aren’t a lobbyist in Washington, a union worker, or an employer nervously trying to prevent your staff from organizing, you might not have followed the twisty history of the latest attempt to increase private-sector unionization. “Card check,” as it is usually known, would allow employees at a company to bypass secret-ballot elections and declare their intent to unionize by simply signing cards. If adopted, it could portend the most revolutionary change to labor law since the 1940s.

The battle over card check is part of a much larger story of Campaign ’08: the coming-out party of Democratic interest groups. For the first time since 1992, Democrats are eyeing complete control of the executive and legislative branches, with all of the spoils of appointment and legislative scheduling that would entail. Unions want to grow their numbers. Green industries want tax incentives. Trial lawyers want a ceasefire in the war on torts.

If these groups could actually form a line in January, the unions would be at the front. Card check was the brainchild of organizers who had watched their numbers tumble as manufacturing jobs moved out of the rust belt and successive conservative administrations made it tougher to organize. President Bill Clinton, signer of NAFTA, did little to stop the skid from labor’s point of view. The organizers have learned their lessons, pushing members of the House and Senate—including the junior senators from New York and Illinois—to commit in writing to card check.

“When we started working on this legislation five years ago,” Acuff said at Take Back America, “people in Washington said it would never be taken seriously, never pass the laugh test.” Bills were introduced in 2003, 2005, and 2007. The first two times, they never reached the floor, with Republicans arguing that labor organizers usually win unionization elections anyway and that 90 percent of those results are approved by the federal government’s National Labor Relations Board within two months. In 2007, with the Democrats in charge of the legislature, the same bill passed the House easily and won 51 votes in the Senate, but that wasn’t enough to proceed to an up-or-down vote. All along, the effort has faced a veto threat from President Bush.

Things are different now. Democrats believe that as many as nine Republican-held Senate seats are vulnerable in 2008. The AFL-CIO, Change to Win, and allied unions plan to spend $360 million on the 2008 election. That’s around $200 million more than the unions spent in the Kerry-Bush race. As Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton slug it out for the nomination, the AFL-CIO is running a $53 million campaign attacking John McCain—portraying him as a right-wing ideologue who co-sponsored the Secret Ballot Protection Act, the GOP’s attempt at making kryptonite against card check.

All that union money comes with a promise: What’s good for unions will be good for the Democrats. Greg Tarpinian, a Change to Win organizer who spoke at the Take Back America panel, pointed out that union membership was one of the strongest determinants for a voter choosing a Democratic ballot. “If union membership was 10 percent in Ohio in 2004,” he argued, “John Kerry would be president.”

If card check passes, Tarpinian has only one worry: the ability of the National Labor Relations Board to “keep up with the demand” for brand new unions. Those new brothers and sisters of the labor movement will start paying dues; said dues will find their way to new Democratic campaigns like salmon finding their way upstream.

Republicans and business lobbyists are watching all of this with a sense of resigned horror. They know Democrats will have the votes, and they believe that the end of secret ballot elections will be not just bad for business, but bad for democracy. They also see card check as the tip of a spear. One Republican staffer worried to me about collective bargaining rights for public employees. “Do we really want fire-fighters to start striking?” he asked.

The unions stand to be the biggest beneficiaries of an all-Democratic Washington. Affordable housing advocates, meanwhile, want the 2007 Federal Housing Finance Reform Act, which created a $3 billion fund bankrolled with tax revenue and the profits of Freddie Mac and Fannie Mae, to be spent on more housing units instead of held up by concerns over budget deficits. Trial lawyers have paid their dues: The American Association for Justice spent $6.3 million to elect Democrats in 2006 through its political action committee, the most of any single PAC. For the first half of this decade, the plaintiffs industry fought a rearguard action against the tort reform movement, which Republicans have been using to limit the size of settlements. Trial lawyers lost a big battle when the Senate passed class action lawsuit reform in 2005, but they haven’t given much ground since then. When the Democrats come back, plaintiffs expect to go back on offense.

The Consumer Product Safety Reform Act, passed this year, is a model of what to expect in a Democratic future. The law doubled funding for the eponymous safety commission to $155 million by 2015, set no caps on damages, and empowered state attorneys general to make federal cases if they have “reason to believe that the interests of the residents of that State have been, or are being, threatened or adversely affected by a violation” of consumer safety. It passed the Democratic-controlled Senate by 79-13, aided by the scare over tainted toys from China.

But unions outmatch every other member of the Democratic coalition in demands and expectations. Now is their time. One organizer told me that a Democratic comeback would mean that the party had “no more excuses” for not giving them what they wanted. At Take Back America, Acuff said the party should gift-wrap anything wavering Republicans want if it will get the bill to a floor vote. “If we have to build a bridge somewhere to get it passed, then build the damn bridge!” he said. “If we have to rename a highway after somebody, rename the highway!”

Another activist, relaxing after a day of sessions and meetings, regaled me with stories of how businesses bust unions, how the National Labor Relations Board punctures budding movements, and how essential it was to change the system. He repeated my question back to me. “If we get a Democratic president, are we going to pass card check?” He leaned back and grabbed a Miller Lite from one of his brothers coming back from the bar. “If the sun comes up in the morning, we’re passing card check.”


7) Estimate: Gag order on Olmert probe to be partially lifted Thursday
By Aviram Zino

State Prosecutor's office says investigation against PM to advance at accelerated pace to help it decide on whether to indict

Sources in the State Prosecutor's Office said that certain details pertaining to the most recent investigation against Prime Minister Ehud Olmert will be publicized Thursday evening.

Media Blackout
Police say will appeal court decision to lift gag order on Olmert case / Efrat Weiss
After turbulent weekend of ambiguous reports, officials vow scope (and validity) of new investigation against premier will soon come to light. Meanwhile police threaten to contest any move to end media blackout as Knesset Opposition finally takes swing at Olmert.



The details have so far been kept secret in adherence with a court-issued gag order.



According to the sources, the investigation is now expected to progress at an accelerated pace to help the prosecutor's office reach a decision on whether to file an indictment against the prime minister.


The Justice Ministry is expected to ask the Jerusalem District Court on Thursday to partially lift its gag order, particularly in light of recent reports in the foreign press that have revealed extensive details on the affair.


The information, which was posted on the websites of the New York Times and the New York Post, is still under embargo in Israel due to the gag order.


In what was considered an unusual legal maneuver, Attorney General Menachem Mazuz asked the court on Tuesday to depose the foreign national involved in the case, prior to deciding on an indictment.



Considered an unusual legal maneuver, deposing a witness at this stage of the investigation is usually done when there is a substantial chance the witness would not be able to appear in court during trial. In Olmert's case, the man in question – who is not an Israeli citizen – may wish to return to the US. The court is expected to decide on Mazuz's request by the end of the week.



The PM was questioned under advisement for over an hour on Friday. At present time the only information cleared for publication merely confirms the new allegations concern events that took place prior to his ascension to the premiership.


8) Why Hillary Can't Win
By Ross Douthat



Barack Obama won a resounding victory in the North Carolina primary, and Hillary Clinton barely edged him out in Indiana.

In a different, bygone era, Hillary Clinton's loss in North Carolina last night probably wouldn't have inspired the pundit class to pronounce her campaign finally and officially toast. After all, there's still no plausible way for Barack Obama to assemble the 2,025 delegates he needs to clinch the nomination without persuading at least a hundred or so of the famously uncommitted super delegates to leap on board his bandwagon. And there's nothing in the Democratic Party's rules that promises the nomination to the candidate who's merely leading in the delegate count or the popular vote. If anything, it's the reverse: A system that requires the winner to marshal a super majority of delegates rather than a mere majority, and that throws a slew of super delegates into the mix, would seem to be designed to have close races decided at the convention, rather than by a whisker-thin majority in a voting system that, were it designed differently, might have Hillary in the lead instead.

Certainly, this is how things used to work. Nobody was surprised or appalled when Ronald Reagan tried to unseat Gerald Ford at the 1976 Republican Convention, or when various Democrats (led by none other than Jimmy Carter) mounted an unsuccessful "Stop McGovern" effort in Miami in 1972, even though both Ford and McGovern went into those conventions leading in delegates and votes. But it isn't how they work anymore. When you listen to analysts and politicians talk about the primary process, there's a clear consensus that the spectacle of a convention in which super delegates "overturn what's happened in the elections," as Nancy Pelosi famously put it, would be disastrous for the Democratic Party. And Pelosi's choice of the word "overturn" tells you why: It implicitly makes the will of the people, however imperfectly and haphazardly expressed (an open primary here, a closed primary there, a caucus elsewhere), the arbiter of legitimacy, and consigns to the dustbin of history the old idea that the convention is an integral part of the candidate-selection process, and that party leaders should have as much of a say in who gets to be their standard-bearer as primary voters and caucus goers.

So while the design of the system technically allows super delegates to do what they think is best for the party (or for themselves and their constituents), the realities of life in a mass democracy make "overturning" even a narrow margin in votes and delegates well-nigh unthinkable. Which is why Hillary needed a chance at some sort of popular-vote lead (with Florida thrown in, if nothing else) to justify continuing her campaign. And it's why, after last night's results extinguished even that thin hope, her campaign is finally finished, whether she's ready to admit it or not.