"My theory: He is lambasting the court to set up public opinion in his favor so that he can blame the court for “undermining” his “care”…. (See 1 and 1a below.)
My response:"Of course that is why he is President Pinata the supreme bullying narcissist. Would you want him to have your back? " (See 1b below.)
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Tom Friedman is just shy of being a complete witless idiot and to prove it:
a) He writes for The New York Times.
b) He has solutions that are unworkable and brainless.
c) He believes in his thinking. (See 2 below.)
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Let's hear it from PJTV: "Trifecta -- Trayvon Tragedy: Did NBC Edit the Zimmerman 911 Tape to Serve a Political Agenda?
When does incompetence become actual malfeasance? NBC’s “Today” played an edited version of George Zimmerman’s 911 call on the night of the Trayvon Martin shooting, and it just so happened to support the media-created narrative surrounding the tragedy. Bill Whittle, Steve Green and Scott Ott discuss the media malfeasance apparent in the Trayvon Martin case.
President Barack Obama has declared war on the Supreme Court in advance of the Court's ObamaCare decision. Noting that the justices are “unelected,” Obama said he is confident that the Court will not take an “unprecedented and extraordinary step” of overturning the law. Why is Obama trying to discredit the Court instead of making the constitutional argument for his health care legislation?"
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And now for a little humor: "This IS what will happen when we are forced to work
after age 70.
http://www.YouTube.com/watch_popup?v=19THRdXxmaI"
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And now let's hear a
--
"Even after the Super Bowl victory of the New Orleans Saints, I have noticed a large number of people, implying with bad jokes and anecdotes, that Loozianna Cajuns ain't smart. I would like to state for the record that I disagree with that assessment. Anybody who would build a city 5 feet below sea level in a hurricane zone and fill it with Democrats who can't swim is a damn genius".
This from a great e mail and personal friend and fellow memo reader: "Subj: The "civil" President
Obama labels the Ryan budget "Social Darwinism". And he is the one who has criticized his political opponents for a lack of "civility" in their comments about his administration? See this:
"Because of the negative connotations of the theory of social Darwinism, especially after the atrocities of the [[Second World War]] (including the [[Holocaust]]) the term is generally seen as pejorative, and few people would describe themselves as social Darwinists."
It is widely known that Nazism drew on the theory of Social Darwinism in deciding how it would raise the Aryan race to perfection by eliminating all those who were "flawed" in some way (like being Jewish or a "Socialist"). So the President throws this nasty term at the Republicans? If the Republican establishment lets this pass without some extreme ass-kicking we will know that for them the game is over and they truly are a bunch of toothless hacks unworthy of Conservative support. The President should be forced to apologize for this slur if there is any backbone left in the Republican Party or the illustrious media in this country.
Con Massey
Will Republicans rise to the occasion/challenge?
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Steve Forbes has legitimate fears should Obama be re-elected!
Forbes would make a decent Treasury Secretary.(See 3 below.)
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Israel's Barak draws lines in the sand. (See 4 below.)
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There was a meeting of News Executives in D.C. today at which both Obama and Romney spoke.
Apparently events are shaping up so they will be the two opponents come November.
Both offer their version of what our nation will be like .
In the case of Obama, it would appear we will have deficits beyond our ability to discharge, a nation divided and a president who lacks the ability or desire to lead in a direction comfortable to most Americans. He will continue to do as he pleases disregarding Constitutional checks and balances and will blame everything on others. He also, if elected, is prepared to press forward in one of the largest wealth transfers in both world and American history in order to right perceived and real wrongs and build more dependent constituencies which will continue voting for Liberals and progressives.
It is also likely Obama will dismember our military and continue to weaken our standing in the world community as he pursues a path of negotiations with Islamist radicals who will break any agreement reached only to begin more negotiations based on new demands ie., the N Korean pattern. He will continue to seek accords on a variety of topics with Russia and China but , leading from weakness, is more likely to give than get.
I suspect our economic growth will continue paltry and the government's revenue stream will decline as deficits widen. The dollar should continue to lose value and inflation will ultimately rear its head not because of economic growth but simply because interest rates will rise as a consequence of our economic impotency..
If elected, Romney will seek to turn us from the path we have been on for decades by attempting to lead our nation away from indulgences we no longer can afford. Not an easy task and one most likely to create great angst and challenges politically. If successful in bailing out the leaky ship we have become, the nation might begin to return to some semblance of normal growth and competitiveness.
Tax reform, reduced government growth and elimination of burdensome and frivolous rules and regulations are three goals Romney must pursue with diligence.
Obama's re-election will result in a pasting over whereas Romney's will be akin to open heart surgery and thus riskier in its implementation and success. Romney will have no allies in the press and media. Partly, because they will be nursing wounds of having lost their 'man' and because their philosophical moorings are liberal. Unless both houses of Congress end up in Republican control, Romney will have little help from Congress to implement the necessary changes he must institute.
Come November voters will have two stark choices both of which will produce pain but the pain will be different in nature, ie. continued chronic pain versus pain associated with rehabilitation.
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Dick
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1)Obama's Base Play
Maybe his attack on the Supreme Court isn't quite as kooky as it seems.
By JAMES TARANTO
"A Federal Appeals Court has asked a [Justice Department] lawyer to write 'Madison v. Marbury' on the blackboard one hundred times," quips blogger Tom Maguire. That's only a slight exaggeration. CBS's Jan Crawford tells what happened yesterday at a hearing of the Fifth U.S. Circuit Court of Appeals:
The [three-judge] panel is hearing a separate challenge to the health care law by physician-owned hospitals. The issue arose when a lawyer for the Justice Department began arguing before the judges. Appeals Court Judge Jerry Smith immediately interrupted, asking if DOJ agreed that the judiciary could strike down an unconstitutional law.
The DOJ lawyer, Dana Lydia Kaersvang, answered yes--and mentioned Marbury v. Madison, the landmark case that firmly established the principle of judicial review more than 200 years ago, according to the lawyer in the courtroom.
Smith then became "very stern," the source said, suggesting it wasn't clear whether the president believes such a right exists. The other two judges on the panel, Emilio Garza and Leslie Southwick--both Republican appointees--remained silent, the source said.
Smith, a Reagan appointee, went on to say that comments from the president and others in the Executive Branch indicate they believe judges don't have the power to review laws and strike those that are unconstitutional, specifically referencing Mr. Obama's comments [Monday] about judges being an "unelected group of people."
As Texas Lawyer reports, Judge Smith ordered Kaersvang to produce a letter of "at least three pages single-spaced, no less," stating "the position of the attorney general and the Department of Justice" on the president's statements.
The president, as we noted yesterday, subsequently qualified his position to acknowledge the existence of judicial review. Lots of people have been scratching their heads trying to figure out what Obama thinks he's doing here. His attacks on the Supreme Court have been so ignorant and undignified as to seem a bit kooky.
One theory is that he's trying to intimidate the justices into deciding the case his way. But if that's his aim, it would be odd to wait until after they've heard the case--and, it is believed, after they've privately voted on it--to begin the campaign. Moreover, while we'd say a politician's trash talk is unlikely to have any effect on the justices at all, the odds that it would influence them in his favor are surely minuscule. Judges jealously guard their independence, as the Fifth Circuit demonstrated yesterday. They're right to do so.
Although he claims to be confident that the court will uphold ObamaCare, a president who was truly confident would keep quiet about it. Actually, a president with the merest respect for the structure of American government--and for his own office--would keep quiet about it, whether confident or not.
The best explanation is that he is preparing politically for a judicial defeat. But that begs the question of why he is taking the particular, and highly unusual, approach of waging rhetorical war on the Supreme Court. Perhaps there's a clue to that question in a recent post by the New York Times's Nate Silver.
Silver seeks to counter the counterintuitive argument that a ruling against ObamaCare would help Obama's re-election chances:
The theory seems to rest on the notion that Mr. Obama could use the health care bill to rally his base, either by railing against the Supreme Court or by trying to advance a new plan.
There are a few basic problems with it:
1. Mr. Obama does not face a major problem with his base, but his standing is tenuous with swing voters.
2. Among swing voters, the health care bill is not very popular.
3. The Supreme Court declaring the health care bill unconstitutional will not make it more popular among swing voters.
We agree with points 2 and 3, and also with Silver's conclusion that an adverse ruling would be of no help to Obama politically. (It would be a crushing ideological defeat to boot.)
But we take issue with Silver's first half-point, that Obama "does not face a major problem with his base." To be sure, Silver has numbers to back up this assertion: "Obama's approval ratings are now 84 percent with Democrats and 87 percent with liberal Democrats, according to the latest Gallup poll. Those numbers are fairly normal by historic standards."
Fair enough. The base is happy with Obama now. But how will they feel three months from now if the court has struck down the president's signature "achievement"?
We can't look ahead in time to see, of course, but we can look back. Remember last summer, or "The Left's Summer of Discontent," as we called it in The Wall Street Journal? Because of Obama's rigid negotiating position, Republicans had bested him in the debt-ceiling dispute with Congress, and the left was furious at the president, demanding that he "fight" harder and vilify his domestic enemies. He complied--though with no legislative results--and that succeeded in redirecting the Angry Left's anger.
As we noted in our August essay, "Everyone loves a winner, and progressives are angry and disconsolate with Mr. Obama because they increasingly see him as a loser." If the Supreme Court strikes down ObamaCare, Obama will be a loser again. If he shows what normal people regard as due deference to a coequal branch of government, the Angry Left will see him as a weak loser and may turn their anger against him.
And think of how furious they'll be if the entire law--which is really the only major progressive "accomplishment" of Obama's presidency--is struck down because the individual mandate is unconstitutional. The left doesn't even like the individual mandate. They had to swallow an idea that came from the Heritage Foundation and that enriches the hated insurance companies, as the price for "health care reform," and now they're not even getting that. Such indignity!
If this theory is right, then Obama is attacking the Supreme Court in order to deflect the rage of his own followers. He has a problem with his base, all right, and he wants to turn it into someone else's problem.
Fallow the Leader
If you're not a Supreme Court justice, that doesn't mean Barack Obama doesn't want to tell you how to do your job. RealClearPolitics notes that in his speech yesterday to the American Society of Newspaper Editors, the president lectured reporters that he expects more favorable coverage even than he's received:
"This bears on your reporting," President Obama said to journalists. "I think that there is oftentimes the impulse to suggest that if the two parties are disagreeing then they're equally at fault and the truth lies somewhere in the middle. And an equivalence is presented which I think reinforces peoples' cynicism about Washington in general. This is not one of those situations where there's an equivalency."
"As all of you are doing your reporting, I think it's important to remember that the positions that I am taking now on the budget and a host of other issues. if we had been having this discussion 20 years ago or even 15 years ago . . . would've been considered squarely centrist positions," Obama said a few moments later.
Some journalists agree as The Atlantic Wire reports:
It's a message The Atlantic's James Fallows has been championing for awhile now and happily acknowledged in the president's remarks yesterday. "From the commanding heights of our government, the 'false equivalence' problem seems to be coming into view," Fallows wrote.
Hey, Fallows! C'mere! Fetch! Aww, good boy! What a cute little lapdog!
'It's On'? That's Way Off.
"The Obama campaign apparently has taken down a web video that featured an actress touting the fact the incumbent president wouldn't 'have to worry' about re-election in a second term," FoxNews.com reports:
In the web video that was taken down, actress Tatyana Ali talked casually about the implications of the president's re-election.
"What really makes me excited about that is that a United States president only has two terms," she said. "In the second term, it's on"--because they wouldn't have to worry about re-election.
Some conservatives find this chilling, but it seems to us to be another example of Obama's hubris. Even if he wins re-election, what makes him think "it" will be "on"? Think about what's happened to other recent presidents in their second terms: George W. Bush had Katrina and the loss of public support in Iraq. Bill Clinton was impeached. Ronald Reagan had Iran-contra. Richard Nixon had to resign. Lyndon Johnson ended his re-election bid in the face of growing opposition to the Vietnam War.
Even Franklin D. Roosevelt, who went on to win a third term and then a fourth one, ran out of steam in his second term, when he proposed his politically disastrous court-packing plan--an idea CBS Radio's legal editor Andrew Cohen hilariously urges Obama to revive. Obama sometimes seems like a lame duck already. If he does win a second term, he'll very likely be lamer rather than duckier.
Great Moments in Socialized Medicine
"An elderly woman was ordered to find a new GP because the 'carbon footprint' of her two-mile round trips to the surgery where she had been treated for 30 years was too large," London's Daily Telegraph reports:
Avril Mulcahy, 83, was told to address the "green travelling issues" over her journeys from her home in Westcliff-on-Sea, Essex, to the West Road Surgery. The surgery wrote to Mrs Mulcahy, telling her to register with a new GP within 28 days.
The letter said: "Our greatest concern is for your health and convenience but also taking into consideration green travelling issues. Re: Carbon footprints and winter weather conditions, we feel it would be advisable for patients to register at surgeries nearer to where they live.
"We would be very grateful if you could make the necessary arrangements to re-register at another practice."
"In Britain, the government itself runs the hospitals and employs the doctors," former Enron adviser Paul Krugman has written. "We've all heard scare stories about how that works in practice; these stories are false." That would be a relief if only Krugman didn't have such a long record of mendacity.
As far as we know, ObamaCare doesn't address the "problem" of carbon footprinting when going to the doctor, but who knows where government control of medicine might lead next? And don't forget Barack Obama is concerned about this stuff too, as the Hill reports:
"Cap-and-trade was originally proposed by conservatives and Republicans as a market-based solution to solving environmental problems," Obama said during a fiery speech at a luncheon hosted by The Associated Press.
Obama, isn't satisfied with bad liberal ideas. He wants to enact every bad idea conservatives have ever come up with too
1a)Pandering to the Ignorant
By Doug Patton
Omaha, Nebraska — Every election year, politicians and the media decry the low voter participation in our elections. Indeed, it is a pathetic record, with any turnout greater than 50 percent generally considered high. However, contrary to popular opinion, not everyone should vote. In fact, most people should not vote.
As I have written before, voters should have to pass a basic civics test, especially to vote in federal elections. If you can list the top three contestants on American Idol, the final four teams in NCAA basketball, and the names of the characters on Jersey Shore, but you can’t name the vice president of the United States, the Speaker of the House, at least two Supreme Court Justices, and the three branches of the federal government, then I don’t want you helping to choose my leaders. Go home and watch South Park.
Imagine how many potential Obama voters could be eliminated by such a test. Remember Peggy the Mooch in Grant Park on election night telling us how great it was going to be under this president because she would no longer have to pay her mortgage or fill up her tank? Wouldn’t you love to run into her at the pump today and ask how she likes $4.00 gas?
Or the people lined up waiting for “Obama money.” Remember them? When asked where Obama got that money, they replied, “We don’t know. From his stash! He’s the president! That’s why we love him!”
So what makes anyone believe that voters like these have the first clue what Obamacare is all about? Free health care! Whoopee! HOPE AND CHANGE!
Do you think they understand the ramifications of HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius’s newfound powers — under Obamacare — to countermand the First Amendment’s guarantee of the free exercise of religion? Do you think they even know who Kathleen Sebelius is? It doesn’t matter. O-BA-MA! O-BA-MA!
Is there any chance that even a slim majority of Obama voters know what he will do to the Supreme Court if he is re-elected, or even that he has the authority to appoint Supreme Court Justices? No they don’t, but YES WE CAN!
One of the reddest states in the country is right here in Nebraska, and until Barack Obama pulled one electoral vote out of the state in 2008 by winning the predominantly urban 2nd Congressional District, no Democratic presidential candidate had managed to win anything here since Lyndon Johnson carried the state against Barry Goldwater in 1964. So it may surprise some to learn that even Nebraska is falling prey to the ignorance of the Obama era.
Recently the Douglas County Board in Omaha voted to cut the county budget, thereby mandating that Election Commissioner Dave Phipps reduce the budget for his department by $115,000 per year. A Republican appointee who obviously takes his fiscal responsibilities seriously, Phipps dutifully proceeded to make the necessary cuts by eliminating roughly half the polling places in the county.
Of course, in this era of the allegedly disenfranchised liberal voter (no one ever squawks about disenfranchised conservative voters), the shrieks from the left have been deafening. Never mind that any voter in the state can request an early ballot by mail — no questions asked — to fill out in the comfort and privacy of his or her own home, an option now exercised by roughly 30 percent of those who bother to vote. That doesn’t seem to matter to the whining PC crowd, who claim these cuts are “unfair” to the poor, to minorities, and to the elderly.
At the same time, Nebraska’s one-eyed, dysfunctional, “non-partisan” Unicameral Legislature in Lincoln rejected a bill requiring photo identification to vote. The mere introduction of such a bill led to cries of racism from the usual suspects — the chronic complainers on the left who have a vested interest in seeing illegal aliens and other ineligible individuals acquire and keep the right to vote.
And therein lies the secret of Barack Obama’s hopes for re-election: pander to the ignorant who buy the lies of the left and would not have a clue how to survive without a nanny-state to take care of them.
© 2012 by Doug Patton
Doug Patton describes himself as a recovering political speechwriter who agrees with himself much more often than not. Now working as a freelance writer, his weekly columns of sage political analysis are published the world over by legions of discerning bloggers, courageous webmasters and open-minded newspaper editors. Astute supporters and inane detractors alike are encouraged to e-mail him with their pithy comments at dougpatton@cox.net.
1b)What a Bully President Obama Has Suddenly Become,' Says SC Gov.
By Susan Jones
"What is amazing is what a bully President Obama has suddenly become," South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley (R) said on Wednesday.
The man who took office on a promise of 'hope and change' is now bullying people to get his way, Haley told Fox & Friends. "He's bullying his way on Paul Ryan, saying he's not coming up with an adequate budget. Now he's bullying the Supreme Court, saying no, they won't reverse (the health care law) -- they won't go against us on this.
"That's not how things work," Haley said. "He has to lead. He's shown no sort of leadership when it comes to balancing a budget. He's shown no leadership when it comes to allowing the states to do the will of the people. He continues to say no to everything."
Haley said Paul Ryan had "great courage" to tackle pressing budget issues.
But on Tuesday, President Obama slammed Ryan's budget as a "Trojan Horse" disguised as a deficit reduction plan. "It is thinly veiled social Darwinism," Obama said. "It is antithetical to our entire history as a land of opportunity and upward mobility for everybody who’s willing to work for it--a place where prosperity doesn’t trickle down from the top, but grows outward from the heart of the middle class. And by gutting the very things we need to grow an economy that’s built to last -- education and training, research and development, our infrastructure -- it is a prescription for decline."
On Monday, Obama raised eyebrows when he seemed to be sending a stern message to the Supreme Court justices about his Affordable Care Act:
"Ultimately, I’m confident that the Supreme Court will not take what would be an unprecedented, extraordinary step of overturning a law that was passed by a strong majority of a democratically elected Congress,” Obama said. “I guess I would remind conservative commentators that for years what we’ve heard is the biggest problem on the bench is judicial activism or a lack of judicial restraint. For an unelected group of people to somehow overturn a duly constituted and passed law is a good example of that, and I’m pretty sure this court will recognize that and not take that step.”
On Tuesday, Obama clarified his remarks, but made essentially the same point:
"And the point I was making is that the Supreme Court is the final say on our Constitution and our laws, and all of us have to respect it, but it’s precisely because of that extraordinary power that the Court has traditionally exercised significant restraint and deference to our duly elected legislature, our Congress. And so the burden is on those who would overturn a law like this.
Now, as I said, I expect the Supreme Court actually to recognize that and to abide by well-established precedence out there. I have enormous confidence that in looking at this law, not only is it constitutional, but that the Court is going to exercise its jurisprudence carefully because of the profound power that our Supreme Court has. As a consequence, we’re not spending a whole bunch of time planning for contingencies" (in case the law is overturned).
"What I did emphasize yesterday is there is a human element to this that everybody has to remember."
Obama repeated that he doesn't anticipate the Supreme Court striking down the Democrats' health care law. "I think they take their responsibilities very seriously," he said.
In another development on Tuesday, a federal appeals court judge in Texas -- troubled by Obama's remarks about the propriety of unelected judges striking down acts of Congress -- ordered a Justice Department attorney to give him -- within 48 hours -- a three-page letter, single spaced, specifically referring the president's statements and what they mean.
5th Circuit Court of Appeals Judge Jerry Smith said he wants to know the position of U.S. Attorney General Eric Holder and the Justice Department on the concept of judicial review.
"I want to be sure that you are telling us that the Attorney General and the Department of Justice do recognize the authority of the federal courts through unelected judges to strike acts of Congress or portions thereof in appropriate cases," Smith said.
The judge made the request during oral arguments in a separate challenge to another aspect of the federal health care law, the Associated Press reported.
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2)TO EDITORS OF THE NEW YORK TIMES:
By LEO RENNERT
New York Times columnist Tom Friedman has come up with a new brainstorm to resolve the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. To allay Israeli security concerns, the Palestinians, he writes, must couple non-violent resistance with their own map for a two-state solution. “Just calling for an ‘end to occupation’ won’t cut it,” he advises The map, he explains, would demonstrate that Palestinians are ready to settle for 95 percent of the West Bank and all Arab neighborhoods of East Jerusalem (“A Middle East Twofer,” page A19, April 4).
However, Friedman seems to overlook the fact that he’s merely recycling the two-state map that Bill Clinton and then-Prime Minister Ehud Barak offered Yasser Arafat in 2000 and 2001 – a map immediately rejected by Yasser Arafat. Friedman also seems to have forgotten that such a map again was offered to the Palestinians more recently, in 2008, by then-Prime Minister Ehud Olmert – again a map immediately repudiated by Mahmoud Abbas. In fact, Olmert even went one better on Friedman by throwing in a huge sweetener for the Palestinians – internationalization of Jerusalem’s religious shrines under a consortium in which the Palestinians, Jordan and Saudi Arabia would be represented.
Also overlooked by Friedman is that Abbas and Palestinians have been brandishing a completely different map of their own – a map that leaves no room whatsoever for Israel. It’s a map that projects a one-state solution – a Palestinian state – from the Jordan River to the Mediterranean Sea. Never mind Hamas’s up-front objective to eliminate Israel. The Palestinian Authority’s agenda reaches the same objective. And its desired borders infuse PA textbooks, media, sermons and other types of propaganda.
To this end, Abbas conducts an all-out global campaign to delegitimize Israel by erasing all Jewish historical ties to the Holy Land. The latest such anti-Israel propaganda piece was disseminated by the Palestinian Authority during Holy Week – a contention that Moses really was a Muslim who led a Muslim Exodus from Egypt. Under Abbas, Jews aren’t even entitled to their Passover.
In an apt parallel, Friedman’s fantasy world, which abets such Palestinian myths, is also inhabited by Times correspondents in the paper’s news pages. Witness two “news” articles in the same March 4 edition
Writing about Israeli government plans to evict Jewish settlers from a house they bought in Hebron, correspondent Isabel Kershner provides her own history of Hebron – a history that fails to mentions Jews or Jewish. (“Netanyahu slows eviction of Settlers From a House” page A8).
“Hebron is a hotly contested city where several hundred Jewish settlers live among almost 200,000 Palestinians,” Kershner writes. “The house in question is near the Cave of the Patriarchs, where Abraham, Isaac, Jacob and their wives, the biblicall matriarchs, are said to be buried. The site is revered by Muslims and Jews and has been fought over for centuries.”
Note that Kershner uses “biblical” instead of “Jewish” so as to give Muslims as much of a claim to Hebron as Jews may have. When it comes to revering the Cave of the Patriarchs, Kershner even puts Muslims ahead of Jews.
Kershner’s history fails to point out that Hebron is the site of the oldest Jewish community in the world. In addition to the Cave of the Patriarachs, Hebron is where King David was anointed and reigned for seven years before heading to Jerusalem. Jews lived in Hebron for centuries until 1929 when an Arab pogrom murdered 67 Jews and drove all other Jews out of Hebron, Judaism’s second holiest city. Hebron’s Judenrein status was short-lived, however. Israel captured the city in the 1967 war.
None of this interests Kershner or appears in her article.
Pro-Palestinian spin also infuses an article by correspondent Marlise Simons about the International Criminal Court tossing out a Palestinian charge that Israel committed “war crimes” during its three-week counter-terrorism offensive in Gaza in late 2008. The court held that it can only deal with parties that have attained statehood (“Court Rejects Palestinians In Their bid For a a Tribunal” page A9).
Simons’ article is laced with sympathy for the Palestinians’ latest failure to get statehood recognition. “Some groups still express hope that a prospective Palestinian state can take its case to the court because it has found few places to seek justice,” Simons writes.
What Simons fails to acknowledge is that the Palestinian idea of “justice” leaves Israel with none at all.
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3) Forbes to Newsmax: An Obama Win Will Lead to New Recession
By Jim Meyers and John Bachman
Forbes magazine editor and former presidential candidate Steve Forbes tells Newsmax that Mitt Romney will win the GOP presidential nomination and defeat President Obama in the November election.
But he warns that an Obama victory — perhaps even the anticipation of an Obama win — will lead to a market selloff and another recession.
Forbes is president and CEO of Forbes Inc. He ran for the Republican presidential nomination in 1996 and 2000, urging the adoption of a flat income tax with a single tax rate. He makes frequent appearances on the Fox News Channel.
Forbes originally endorsed Rick Perry for the Republican presidential nomination. But with victories in three primaries on Tuesday, Mitt Romney appears to have the nomination sewn up.
In an exclusive interview with Newsmax.TV, Forbes was asked if he has any reservations about now supporting Romney.
“No, I’ll support whoever the nominee is and it looks like he is going to be the nominee,” he says.
“I thought his victory speech [Tuesday night] was very different from the ones he gave before. He didn’t use the pronoun ‘I’ as he tended to do. He was dressed with a necktie instead of the open shirt collar. That’s fine during the day but at night you should dress up for the occasion of addressing the nation. And he gave a speech where he went into much more substance than he has before.
“One of the things about the primary process is it does make you a better candidate, and I think he is light years ahead of where he was three or four months ago.”
Forbes is active with the Club for Growth, a conservative political action committee. One of candidates the group is supporting is Indiana State Treasurer Richard Mourdock, who is running in the GOP primary against incumbent Sen. Richard Lugar.
Forbes explains why he is backing Mourdock: “I think that Richard Mourdock brings a kind of perspective you need today, a kind of dynamism. I think he earned the gratitude of the nation when he tried to uphold a thing called the rule of law when Obama put in his imposition of a bailout on Chrysler and General Motors. He tore up the rule of law. He tore up precedent in bankruptcy. That’s what you do in Argentina, not the United States of America. He resisted.
“Unfortunately the courts did not have the backbone to stop this usurpation of the rule of law. But since then, because of his efforts and the efforts of others, the atmosphere’s changed dramatically where the challenge to Obamacare is now treated with a seriousness that would have been inconceivable two years ago.
“He’s also against the blowout in government spending, wants to simplify the tax code and good things like that. So he brings that good conservative perspective and the energy to try to make positive things happen.”
Forbes cited other candidates the Club is backing.
“[Arizona Congressman] Jeff Flake is a very good candidate [for the Senate]. There’s no incumbent there — Senator John Kyl is retiring,” Forbes says.
“Ohio Treasurer Josh Mandel in Ohio [running against incumbent Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown] is another good one.
“The key thing, whether they’re running against an incumbent or running for a seat where you don’t have an incumbent or challenging a Democratic incumbent, is if they get to Washington are they going to have that kind of dynamism and perspective and understanding why they’re there that so often gets lost when you go to Washington.
“And so if you get a good conservative core there in the Senate, people like Senator Mike Lee from Utah, get allies there, then that’s going to have a profound impact.
“I think Romney will win the election against Obama. But if you have a good conservative core in the Senate you’re going to get things on his desk, the president’s desk, that I think are going to be much stronger for the country, much better for the country, than if they weren’t there.
“So this isn’t just about winning a particular race, it’s also about having the cadres, so to speak, who can make positive things happen.”
Fed Chairman Ben Bernanke has warned of a pending fiscal cliff that the nation is approaching. The Bush tax cuts are set to expire on the first day of 2013, and deep spending cuts are also in the works.
Asked if lawmakers in Washington will be able to deal with this “cliff” without causing turmoil in the markets, Forbes responds: “After the November elections, if President-elect Romney makes it clear that he’ll sign temporary legislation on January 20 extending those tax rates for a few months so Congress can make deliberations on a whole new tax bill, I don’t think the markets are going to have much of a hiccup. I think they’ll make the Bush tax rates retroactive to January 1.
“So the key is who wins the election. If Obama happens to win, I think you’ll see a market selloff. I think we’ll be on the way to another recession. And I think the markets, if they anticipate Obama will win — markets don’t wait for a bad thing to happen, they sell off before it happens.”
Newt Gingrich has said he would support Rick Santorum in the Republican presidential race to ensure an open convention in Tampa in August. Forbes sees that scenario as unlikely.
“The voters have been speaking, and of the contests so far Romney’s won 20, Santorum 11, Gingrich two, Paul none,” he tells Newsmax.
“So no matter what Santorum or Gingrich does together or separately, Romney is going to end up probably picking up the delegates — unless he does something truly crazy. But he’s a disciplined enough man where I don’t think that’s going to happen.”
He was also asked if he believes a Republican White House and GOP Congress would implement a flatter tax code.
“I don’t think you’re going to get a proposal from Mister Romney on the flat tax,” he declares.
“As a matter of fact when I ran 15 years ago, he did ads against the flat tax. But the key thing is if you have the right people in the House and the Senate, the tax bill — and there will be a tax bill or tax bills plural — will be shaped in a way where I think we will get dramatic simplicity.
“We might not get a pure flat tax but we’ll get something pretty close to it, and maybe the flat tax itself. I don’t think Romney is going to resist if he sees there is strong support for genuine tax simplification. I don’t think he wants to meet the fate that the senior George Bush met when he went against the base of the party.
“So the key thing is to have a good base in the Senate, a good base in the House, and then I think we can positively shape the tax legislation.”
Commenting on the United States recently surpassing Japan as the nation with the highest corporate tax rate, Forbes says: “It’s part of the reason why the U.S. economy is not doing well, why this recovery is so punk — proportionately probably even worse than from the early ‘30s.
“Normally when you have a big downturn you have a sharp upturn, at least initially. This time we didn’t get a sharp upturn. This year we’re going about 40 miles an hour on a superhighway when we should be doing about 80, and one of the reasons is the uncertainty about taxes and the high tax burden.”
© 2012 Newsmax. All rights reserved.
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4)Barak reveals conditions for Iran-West talks
By YAAKOV KATZ
Defense minister says strike on Tehran's nuclear facilities not within weeks but can also not wait years. By Marc Israel Sellem
Israel is demanding its allies set Iran’s complete surrender of its stockpile of uranium enriched to 20 percent as one of the goals of the nuclear talks scheduled for mid-April.
Citing 2012 as the “year to stop Iran,” Defense Minister Ehud Barak said Wednesday that he has held discussions with American and European officials in recent weeks with the goal of convincing them to set clear goals for the planned talks with Iran.
Iraq says Iran proposes Baghdad for nuclear talks
The talks are scheduled to begin on April 13 between Iran and representatives of the five permanent members of the United Nations Security Council and Germany, known as P5+1. Disagreements still exist regarding the venue although Istanbul currently appears to be acceptable to all sides.
Barak revealed what Israel’s goals are for the talks: 1) transfer of all uranium enriched to 20 percent – approximately 120 kg. – out of Iran to a third party country; 2) the transfer of the majority of the 5 tons of uranium enriched to 3.5% out of Iran, leaving just enough needed for energy purposes; 3) the closure of the Fordow enrichment facility, buried under a mountain near the city of Qom; 4) the transfer of fuel rods from a third party country to Iran for the purpose of activating the Tehran Research Reactor.
As reported Wednesday in The Jerusalem Post, assessments in the defense establishment are that a confrontation with Iran may be postponed until sometime in 2013. This is the result of the sanctions that have been imposed on Iran and are believed to be effective.
Barak said Wednesday that there was still time before a strike would be required.
“It is not needed within weeks but it is also not something that can wait a number of years,” he said in rare comments to military reporters. “The Iranians are fortifying their facilities and moving deeper underground with every month that passes.”
As a result, Barak said, it was unlikely that Iran would agree to suspend all of its enrichment activities and forfeit its uranium due to the current sanctions, no matter how effective they are.
“I do however look forward to being surprised if the talks with Iran succeed,” he said.
Israel and the US share almost all of their intelligence assessments regarding Iran and, for example, share the opinion that Iran has yet to make the decision to begin enriching uranium to higher military-grade levels and begin building a bomb.
Barak admitted, however, that there were differences between Israel and the US over his claim that Iran was moving into an “immunity zone” and that if Israel waits too long its military option might not be viable past the end of the year.
“This is part of the difference between us and the Americans,” the defense minister said.
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