"Dick Lugar lost for reasons beyond his willingness to work with Democrats.
He lost because:
a) He no longer maintained a home in the State he represented,
b) He had been in the Senate so long he was 'establishment' and had lost touch with those he supposedly represented and
c) yes, he occasionally voted with Democrats but it was more the nature of his supporting vote that became the final straw.
When have Democrats been booted out of office for voting with Republicans, if they ever do? Ben Nelson ? Try the other shoe on the other foot and see where it gets you.
Looney ideas deserve to be voted down and remember Democrats had the good sense to reject their own president's budget but only because it was obviously going to take us over the financial cliff. Yet, the Democrat controlled Senate has not passed a budget for several years. Every corporation and business in the nation has a budget. They may not meet its target but they have one. It is an egregious act of public irresponsibility.
Siding with a party incapable of rational governance should be a badge of honor but when 'March On' goons destroy property it is deemed the act of a few disparate radicals but when one allegedly, according to a biased press and media crowd,Tea Partyer says something untoward the entire movement is indicted.
When overboard bias is put back in the bottle from which it escaped, then, perhaps, balance will return to government. Til then, voters stand your ground. Support the Constitution as a proper response to ill advised hope and change and a president who pits citizen against citizen, engages in outright reactionary lies used to stir racial discord. Yes, bring this out of control presidency to its knees.
DC is at an impasse and will remain so until politicians on both sides come to their fiscal senses. That is what our founders intended and it will eventually be resolved but probably not before we are bankrupted both financially and morally.
But then, has not that been the goal of radical thinking progressives all along? Their fuzziness should have been rejected but all too often was allowed to creep into the public's psyche by the likes of soft spoken Lugar's?"
Meanwhile, Noonan disagrees. (See 1 below.)
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As for Obama and his campaign: he cannot run on his own record, which is a mixture of amateurish incompetence, so he has chosen to run against Romney's record; which is rather distinguished, mistakes an all. And Obama is deemed to be bright. Clever, full of guile and very underhanded but bright - hardly.
Obama attacks Romney and Bain for wanting to make money by trying to improve the success of failing businesses and brazenly asserts that is not the role of the president.
Obama has consistently failed in his selections of government funded enterprises, cost Americans billions for these unsuccessful efforts and his solution is to make already dependent citizens even more so on a bloated and ineffective government. If that is a formula for greatness then I am a bigger fool than those who cannot see through Obama's charade.
God Help America if Obama and Biden win a second term. (See 2 and 2a below.)
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This is an intelligent assessment of what we should be doing to resolve our over the cliff financial mess. (See 3 below.)
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More on the Palestinian refugee problem which continues to be supported by UNRWA employees who have cushy jobs. I have been to the neighborhood in French Hill outside Jerusalem where they live in nice homes, drive new cars, ear nice salaries which America mostly pays for and continue with their programs which are meant to perpetuate the problem for political reasons.
Meanwhile, Israel has absorbed millions of refugees virtually with little help.
This article was written by a friend. (See 4 below.)
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Michael Connell, a Retired attorney Constitutional Law Instructor from Carrollton , Texas has read 'Obamascare' in it entirety and these are his thoughts. (See 5 below.)
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Paying more taxes sounds great until it hits home. See PJTV.Com: "ZoNation -- Tax Men in Black: Higher Taxes are Bad For Will Smith and the Poor
“Men in Black” star Will Smith was asked on French TV about his willingness to pay more taxes -- and how he would feel about paying taxes at the levels proposed by French President Hollande. Wait until you see his reaction to a 75 percent income tax. Zo tells Will Smith why higher taxes are not good for the government or the poor."
http://www.pjtv.com/s/HEZDOMA
http://www.pjtv.com/s/HEZDOMA
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This from a dear Landings friend, retired surgeon, professor of medicine and former neighbor of my daughter and son in law:
More flim and flam? (See 6 below.)
Is what I revealed several memos ago about to come into fruition? (See 6a and 6b below.)
---
Roubini at it again - nasty recession ahead.
I have been in his school of thought and believe , though the economy has shown under performing progress, because Obama's policies have not only restrained the recovery they have created tremendous uncertainty so anyone running a business has to feel like a deer caught in headlights , ie paralyzed as to what course of action to pursue. (See 7 below.)
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If America is so loved and respected after three years of Obama's foreign policy initiatives then why would a second rate power's leadership feel they can 'diss' him? (See 8 and 8a below.)
Has it all come down to just one big series of lies followed by more lies? (See 8 b below.)
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----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------This from a dear Landings friend, retired surgeon, professor of medicine and former neighbor of my daughter and son in law:
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Updated American Version Circa 2012Give a man a welfare check, a free cell phone with free monthly minutes, cash for clunker autos, food stamps, section 8 housing with cable TV, free contraceptives, Medicaid, a hundred weeks+ of unemployment checks, a forty ounce malt liquor, access to perscription drugs, and designer Air Jordan shoes, and he will vote for liberal Democrats for a lifetime."
More flim and flam? (See 6 below.)
Is what I revealed several memos ago about to come into fruition? (See 6a and 6b below.)
---
Roubini at it again - nasty recession ahead.
I have been in his school of thought and believe , though the economy has shown under performing progress, because Obama's policies have not only restrained the recovery they have created tremendous uncertainty so anyone running a business has to feel like a deer caught in headlights , ie paralyzed as to what course of action to pursue. (See 7 below.)
---
If America is so loved and respected after three years of Obama's foreign policy initiatives then why would a second rate power's leadership feel they can 'diss' him? (See 8 and 8a below.)
Has it all come down to just one big series of lies followed by more lies? (See 8 b below.)
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1)The Case for Sending Senator Lugar Back to Washington
Washington needs seasoned statesmen, especially at a time of national crisis.
By PEGGY NOONAN
Let's wade into an argument, and on what may well be the losing side.
The most recent polls suggest Dick Lugar, the senior U.S. senator from Indiana, first elected in 1976, is on track to lose his primary on Tuesday. I hope he doesn't for a number of reasons but one big one: the Senate needs grown-ups. The entire American government needs grown-ups, from Capitol Hill to the White House to the executive agencies. This is no time to lose one.
What Washington needs is sober and responsible adults. We are as a nation in a moment of real peril, facing challenges that are going to become existential—maybe already are—if we don't do something about them. We won't be able to ignore them—an unsound tax system, increasing and highly ideological regulation, an entitlement system whose demands will crush our children—for long.
So right now, and more than ever, we need mature folk involved in our governance, people for whom not everything is new. People who know how to do things, who began studying a complicated issue 25 years ago and have kept up, who know it backward and forward. People who know the ways of the chamber backward and forward, and who know how to talk across the aisle. There is value in experience, in accomplishment and expertise. There is value in the ability to take the long view, and do your best with modesty and with an eye toward all the big jumbly categories of America, which are not limited to "rightist" and "leftist."
Mr. Lugar, ranking Republican on the Foreign Relations Committee and a longtime leader on controlling nuclear proliferation, is a sober and genial fellow. He is a conservative, always has been. He is experiencing a challenge from the right. He's been under fire, for instance, for voting for the confirmation of Justices Sonia Sotomayor and Elena Kagan. As a matter of form, policy and tradition he did the right thing. He also helped shepherd through the nomination of John Roberts as chief justice. He did the right thing there, too. He firmly backed President Bush on Iraq until he came to have doubts about administration policy and execution, and when he'd thought it through he took to the floor of the senate to explain his thinking, and his break.
He is independent. That's good, a plus: "Your representative owes you, not his industry only, but his judgment," as Edmund Burke observed. Mr. Lugar has won the respect of Senate Democrats. That's good, too. In the future, it may turn out at some moment to be crucial.
The general position of respect he holds in Washington is not new. I remember, in 1988, working for George H.W. Bush, who had just won his party's nomination for the presidency. The Bush entourage was on Air Force Two, en route to Indiana, to celebrate the nominee for vice president, Dan Quayle. Mr. Quayle was a nice man and a capable politician, but he was young. He sat, in the vice president's office on the plane, with Indiana's other senator, Dick Lugar, gray even then. I remember looking from one to another and thinking, "Why him?" Why Quayle and not Lugar, so known and respected? I was not the only person thinking that, on the plane or in the press.
Mr. Lugar's challenger, state treasurer Richard Mourdock, has mounted a tough and determined campaign. He is drawing the endorsements of what is, increasingly, the conservative establishment: FreedomWorks, the Club for Growth, Americans for Tax Reform. Sarah Palin supports him, as does Michele Bachmann.
Mr. Lugar seems to have only one bigfoot, Gov. Mitch Daniels, a man of sound, unshowy judgment whose presence in the presidential primaries would have left them less freaky and more satisfying.
If Mr. Lugar loses, the press will say the tea party did him in, that it's all part of an "ideological purge," it was the extremists versus the GOP establishment and the extremists won. This will be a partial misreading of the situation, but it will be repeated enough to damage the Republican brand, such as it is. In any case, if Mr. Lugar loses the enemies of the GOP will rejoice, because while it's assumed that he would sail through a general election, Mr. Mourdock might struggle.
As for "the tea party," it is good to remember it has blended into the Republican Party, as more or less its rightward edge, and in the blending saved the party. Republicans would have been nowhere if what's called the tea party had gone third-party.
The other reason is a fact. What fuels conservative frustration is not only legislation like ObamaCare and scandals like Solyndra, but a growing sense that for 40 years, members of the party have sent Republicans to Washington and Washington—its spending, its regulating, its demands—keeps getting worse, not better. How could this be? It's not just that Democrats have their Democratic ways, it's that the Republicans they've sent haven't waged a good enough fight. Everything bad there happened while they were there. So—tear it all down, remove everyone and start over.If Mr. Lugar loses on Tuesday it will likely be due to two things. The first is a number: 35. That's how many years he's been in the Senate, how many years he's lived and worked primarily in the environs of Washington, not Indiana, where apparently he no longer has a home. That was a mistake. Thirty-five is a big number. Nonideological people might look at it and think, "It's time for a change."
This is a hard argument to counter because there is some truth in it. No matter who you send, Washington keeps growing. But Mr. Lugar remains as what he is, exceptional, and in his case there are many factors.
He's fought many fights to keep bad policy from being imposed. (Unfortunately, there's never a memorial to the bad bill that didn't happen.) He's waded into serious policy issues, such as disarmament, that get little credit but are crucial. And in a practical sense, conservatives might note that the senior senator from Indiana has just had the scare of his political life. He's never been primaried before.
It is likely that he will return to Washington, if he's allowed to return, newly alive to certain conservative needs and concerns. There, he will be able to take what might be called a refreshed sense of where people are, combine it with a veteran's knowledge of how to move things forward, and help make the kind of progress conservatives long for.
Does all this reflect a bias toward stability, toward those who know how to lead and compromise and find agreement, at a time when Washington seems increasingly immature, feckless, unaware of urgency?
Yes, I do declare that bias. In Washington now very few have their eye on the big picture. Mr. Lugar does.
Mark Peters of this paper wrote a smart piece this week noting that the primary is an open one, and the race may come down to the independent vote.
They should save the old guy. He has value.
2)McGurn: The Dumbing Down of Joe Biden
As the punch line for late-night television jokes, the vice president relieves comics from having to tell any jokes at Mr. Obama's expense.
By WILLIAM MCGURN
Can Joe Biden get any dumber? Just last Thursday, the vice president said he didn't blame the 41% of West Virginia Democrats who voted for an incarcerated felon over Barack Obama in the recent primary because they were acting out of frustration. Just before that, as the president put it, ol' Joe had "got out a little over his skis" by coming out for same-sex marriage while his boss was still evolving.
On Tuesday Mr. Biden takes his act to New Hampshire, where he will speak at a campaign rally at Keene State College. One thing's for certain: Anything remotely colorful will generate yet another round of news stories about the "gaffe-prone vice president." Then again, in some ways that's become Mr. Biden's role.
In a recent documentary on Johnny Carson, Ed McMahon summed up his role as sidekick this way: "You had to be good, but not too good." Every vice president faces that challenge. In Mr. Biden's case, however, his reputation as resident bonehead brings at least one benefit: It distracts folks from asking whether the administration's record really shows Mr. Obama as brilliant and nuanced as we are constantly told he is.
After all, Mr. Biden's penchant for hyperbole didn't begin when he took up residence in Number One Observatory Circle. To the contrary, Mr. Biden came with a long record: here appropriating not only the words but the coal-miner ancestors of a British Labour leader; there saying you can't go into a 7-Eleven "unless you have a slight Indian accent"; there again hailing Mr. Obama as a "clean" African-American.
The difference between then and now? Then, these remarks were hailed as an endearing sign of a genuineness sadly lacking in Washington. That was the argument advanced by David Brooks in the New York Times in August 2008 that ran under the headline "Hoping It's Biden." American voters, he said, were "smart enough to forgive the genuine flaws of genuine people."
When the Washington Post two days later asked a group of "political experts" for their thoughts on Mr. Biden, the superlatives were flowing. These descriptions included "unassailable foreign policy credentials," "good-natured, serious, and truly qualified," "the political maturity and foreign policy gravitas [Obama] lacks," and so on.
In other words, whatever his miscues Mr. Biden was a respected Washington figure. And why not? The senator from Delaware had earned that respect the old-fashioned way: by embracing virtually every enthusiasm that passed for wisdom inside our Beltway. On foreign policy alone, Mr. Biden helped cut off aid to South Vietnam in 1975 after the North invaded. He pushed arms control while opposing the Reagan military buildup. He voted against the Strategic Defense Initiative, voted against the first Gulf War, and so on down the line.
Now he has become a punch line for late-night television. Of course, that makes the vice president a great convenience for our late-night comics. It relieves them of having to do any jokes at Mr. Obama's expense.
After all, it's not as though Mr. Obama has gone gaffe-less. He's told us America has 57 states, called the Malvinas the Maldives during a visit to South America, and hailed his reforms for bringing "inefficiencies to our health-care system." The president's gaffes, however, are simply not echoed the way the vice president's are.
Perhaps that's because casting Mr. Biden as the fool who is weighing the ticket down helps the president escape accountability for his own agenda. Just how wise, for example, was it for Mr. Obama to ignore the economy in favor of a highly unpopular health-care bill that also cost him a Democratic House? Is it Mr. Biden or Mr. Obama whose policies have kept growth sluggish and unemployment north of 8%? And who was right on the contraceptive mandate?
Say this too for Mr. Biden's latest "gaffes": They have the virtue of being true. The 70,000-plus West Virginians who voted for a Texas prisoner were surely signaling frustration. As for same-sex marriage, it's curious isn't it? Mr. Biden is the dolt even though he spoke straightforwardly about his position, while Mr. Obama is lauded as courageous for feeding us yet another line, which is that he thinks same-sex marriage an issue best left to the states.
The truth is that there are two types of Washington people to be wary of. The first are those who emphasize how smart they are. The second—and they are often the same people—are those quick to label others dumb.
Certainly Mr. Biden is more loquacious than most pols, and he's had more than his share of doozies. What makes it different in 2012 is that the same Beltway establishment that once hailed Mr. Biden for speaking his mind now finds that highly inconvenient.
In other words, for President Obama to remain all-wise and wonderful with this record, Mr. Biden has to be the stupid one.
2a)Welcome to the Democrats' Julia Crow Era
By Christopher Chantrill
2a)Welcome to the Democrats' Julia Crow Era
By Christopher Chantrill
When I watch the Democratic attacks on Bain Capital, I wonder: just how do Democrats think the economy is supposed to work?
Take the Kansas City steel plant that Bain took private in 1993 and reassembled as GST Steel. Here we had a faltering unionized steel plant. Nothing remarkable about that, of course. Unionized steel plants had been going out of business for two decades previously, because they were just too expensive and antiquated to be profitable. I remember experiencing that visiting Cleveland, Ohio, in the 1970s. The grand old basic steel plants in the Cuyahoga valley south of town were already wastelands, shuttered and abandoned, and their "good union jobs" gone for good.
Bain struggled with GST Steel for nearly a decade and then shuttered the plant in 2001. Now, in 2012, the Democrats run an ad featuring a former employee calling Bain a "vampire." I assume he meant that Bain sucked the blood out of the company and then spat it out. That's after Bain had transfused $100 million into the company over ten years.
If Bain's actions are reprehensible, then what about the government's bank bailouts, in which the taxpayers stood bail on the banking system, or the auto bailouts when a Democratic administration showered benefits on Democratic constituencies with taxpayer money?
Just what is the principled Democratic way of dealing with industries in decline? What do Democrats think is the fair and efficient way to deal with failing corporations? What about Hewlett-Packard that just announced a layoff of 30,000 this week?
The world is waiting with bated breath for the answer, because, as we know, liberals and Democrats are the educated, the evolved, the intelligent people.
At the dawn of the postwar era the liberal prophet of cartel capitalism, John Kenneth Ga
lbraith, barely worried in American Capitalism that there was "a chance that power developed and even encouraged to neutralize other power, will start on a career of its own." Fortunately, he assured us, these powers--big business, big unions, big government--had "so far comported themselves with some restraint." That was in 1952.
lbraith, barely worried in American Capitalism that there was "a chance that power developed and even encouraged to neutralize other power, will start on a career of its own." Fortunately, he assured us, these powers--big business, big unions, big government--had "so far comported themselves with some restraint." That was in 1952.
Since then there has been no sign that liberals have departed an inch from this top-down crony-capitalist model. In fact the Obama administration has seemed determined, while still splattered with the debris of the cratered auto industry and the housing bubble, to test their Big Unit capitalism to destruction with ObamaCare, green energy, and very fast trains.
Meanwhile, the private capital industry has developed to help entrepreneurstart-ups and to discipline corporations that have taken their eye off the ball. The only thing liberals can think to do is milk the private capitalists for campaign contributions.
There was another time in America when a whole sector of the nation chose to marinate in the past, standing against the future, and that was the Jim Crow era in the South. Defeated in the Civil War, their profitable system of plantation slavery demolished, Southerners could still use political muscle to maintain a bitter and twisted domination over the newly-freed slaves and keep the freedmen from challenging the white political and economic ascendancy. It was liberals that called the nation to abolish that racist abomination.
Today's liberals are in the same position as the Southrons of 1900. Their vision of good jobs, strong unions, defined benefits, and lifetime employment is gone with the wind, never to return. Instead we 
have the economy of "creative destruction" prophesied by that other mid-century prophet, Joseph Schumpeter.
have the economy of "creative destruction" prophesied by that other mid-century prophet, Joseph Schumpeter.
Nothing, we know, is forever in the economy -- or ever was. Railroads, the wonder of 1850, were replaced by oil and steel, the wonders of 1900, and they were replaced by autos and electricity in the 1920s, electronics in the 1950s, computers in the 1980s, and the information revolution of the 1990s.
You can see the new economy in the flap over Jack Welch and women in business. Never mind "diversity, mentorships and affinity groups... 'Over deliver,' Mr. Welch advised. 'Performance is it!'" Predictably the feminazis exploded, so the Wall Street Journal's John Bussey went to 18 woman CEOs of Fortune 500 companies to ask their opinion. They agreed with Welch. "Be open to opportunity and take risks. In fact, take the worst, the messiest, the most challenging assignment you can find, and then take control," said one woman. "I have stepped up to many 'ugly' assignments that others didn't want," said another.
But the liberals are stuck in the past, marinating in their acidic Julia Crow politics. They still have to power to defame and deny, but lack the goodwill do lend a hand and help. And as for "the worst, the messiest, the most challenging assignment?" Today's trustafarian liberals don't believe in getting their hands dirty any more than the scion of yesterday's cotton plantation.
America deserves better from its educated elite.
Christopher Chantrill is a frequent contributor to American Thinker. See his usgovernmentspending.com and also usgovernmentdebt.us. At americanmanifesto.org he is blogging and writing An American Manifesto: Life After Liberalism
---------------------------------------------------------------------------------3)The Long and Short of Fiscal Policy
The economy is too shaky to go cold turkey. We need more stimulus now and deficit reduction later.
By ALAN S. BLINDER
Can we talk about the federal budget deficit? Better yet, can we think about it? For there has been a lot more talking than thinking. One persistent point of confusion arises from the radically different macroeconomic effects of larger budget deficits in the short and long runs.
In the short run—let's say within a year or so—a larger deficit, whether achieved by spending more or taxing less, boosts economic growth by increasing aggregate demand. It's pretty simple. If the government spends more money without raising anyone's taxes to pay the bills, that adds to total demand directly.
That's true, by the way, whether you like the specific expenditures or hate them. Similarly, cutting somebody's taxes without also cutting spending raises spending indirectly—again, whether you like the tax cut or not.
A second layer of subtlety recognizes that some types of spending and some types of tax cuts have larger effects on spending than others, and similarly, that some types are more sharply targeted on job creation than others. Such details matter in designing a cost-effective stimulus package. But for present purposes, let's keep it simple: Higher spending or lower taxes speed up growth by adding to demand.
So, as long as the government can borrow on reasonable terms, the crucial short-run question is: Does the economy need more or less demand? For the last several years, the answer has been clear: more. Bolstering demand was the rationale for fiscal stimulus under President Bush in 2008 and under President Obama in 2009. It remains a persuasive rationale for further stimulus today.
Martin Kozlowski
But that's not going to happen. Instead, the operational budget objective for the coming months is to ensure that we don't shoot ourselves in the collective foot with fiscal austerity while the economy is still weak. Sounds foolish, but we could make that grievous error either by letting ourselves fall off the so-called fiscal cliff that awaits us in January (tax increases and spending cuts amounting to 3.5%-4% of GDP), or by crashing headlong into the national debt ceiling, as we almost did last summer.
But don't we need to reduce the deficit—and by large amounts? Yes, we do, but that's in the long run, where the effects of larger deficits are mostly harmful to economic growth. In the jargon, more government borrowing tends to "crowd out" private borrowers by pushing interest rates up. Those crowded-out borrowers include both consumers who want to buy cars and businesses that want to buy equipment. In the latter case, higher government budget deficits take a toll on growth by slowing down capital formation.
There is an important exception, however, which is highly germane to today's situation. Suppose government borrowing is used to finance productive investments in public capital—such as highways, bridges, and tunnels. Right now, the U.S. government can borrow for 10 years at under 2% per annum. At these super-low interest rates, you don't have to be a genius to find many public infrastructure projects with strongly positive net present values. Borrowing to make such investments will enhance long-run growth, not retard it. And I can't, for the life of me, understand why we are not doing more of it.
But other types of spending, and any tax cut that does not boost capital formation enough, will slow down growth. And that's the fundamental indictment of large deficits.
To think clearly about how to shrink the long-run deficit, we must understand its origins. Looking ahead, the lion's share of projected future deficits comes from rising health-care expenditures.
Some of this cost escalation stems from heavier usage—consuming more health services per capita. But most of it comes from ever-rising relative prices; health care just keeps getting more expensive relative to almost everything else. The good news is that, if we could somehow limit health-care inflation to the overall inflation rate, much of the long-run budget problem would virtually vanish. The bad news is that nobody knows how to do that.
Given this ignorance, President Obama's health-care reform law, which Republicans want to repeal and the Supreme Court may vacate, takes a sensible approach to cost control. It includes—either on an experimental, small-scale, or pilot basis—virtually every cost-containment idea that has been suggested. The pragmatic attitude is: Let's try everything and go with what works.
But what about the middle, between the short run and the long run? When should the federal government get serious about paring its deficit? There is no formulaic answer, but U.S. Treasury borrowing rates will provide a clue. When they start rising on a sustained basis, it will be time to push deficits down. Another important clue will be the health of the economy. The government should stop supporting aggregate demand when the economy is strong enough to stand on its own two feet.
So here, in brief, is my three-step rehab program for our nation's fiscal policy. First, enact a modest stimulus, sharply targeted on job creation—and avoid falling off the fiscal cliff. Second, once the economy is ready, start on something that resembles the 10-year Simpson-Bowles deficit-reduction plan—which would pay for the stimulus 15-20 times over. Third, figure out how to bend the health-care cost curve downward.
The first two steps would actually be easy if we could cut through the political gridlock and act rationally. The third, unfortunately, is not. But thinking that we can solve the long-run deficit problem without it isn't thinking at all.
Mr. Blinder, a professor of economics and public affairs at Princeton University, is a former vice chairman of the Federal Reserve.
------------------------------------------------------------4)Status Update
With the stroke of a pen, a new bill in Congress could slash the number of Palestinian refugees -- and open a world of controversy.
By Jonathan Schanzer
.
A war is brewing on Capitol Hill. And while wars tend to create refugees, this one may result in fewer of them.
Sen. Mark Kirk (R-IL) is trying to get a handle on the real number of Palestinian refugees in the Middle East -- a move that could result in a change of status for millions of Palestinians. His proposed language for the 2013 foreign appropriations bill would require the U.S. government to confirm just how many Palestinians currently served by the U.N. Relief and Works Agency (UNRWA) -- the body taskedwith providing assistance, protection, and advocacy for Palestinian refugees -- are actually refugees. The bill, slated for markup on May 22, would challenge the status of the children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of Palestinian refugees -- a great many of whom claim to be refugees despite the fact that they were never personally displaced in the 1948 and 1967 Arab-Israeli wars.
The aim of this proposed legislation, Kirk's office explains, is not to deprive Palestinians who live in poverty of essential services, but to tackle one of the thorniest issues of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict: the "right of return." The dominant Palestinian narrative is that all of the refugees of the Israeli-Palestinian wars have a right to go back, and that this right is not negotiable. But here's the rub: By UNRWA's own count, the number of Palestinians who describe themselves as refugees hasskyrocketed from 750,000 in 1950 to 5 million today. As a result, the refugee issue has been an immovable obstacle in round after round of negotiations between the Israelis and Palestinians.
How have these numbers swelled, particularly as the Palestinians who fled or were forced from their homes in 1948 and 1967 grew old and died? This question lies at the crux of the Kirk amendment. And the answer is UNRWA.
The knock on UNRWA is that it exists to perpetuate the refugee problem, not solve it. It was UNRWA that bestowed refugee status upon "descendants of refugees," regardless of how much time had elapsed. As a result, the Palestinian refugee population has grown seven-fold since the start of the Arab-Israeli conflict. As one study projects, if descendants maintain their current status, the number of "refugees" in 2020 will be 6.4 million -- despite the fact that few of the actual, displaced Palestinians will still be alive. In 2050, that number will reach 14.7 million.
UNRWA, which calls for a "just and durable" solution to the refugee problem, has unquestionably been a silent partner to the Palestinian leadership. The agency's administration fully understands that if Israel accepted the PLO's demand, it would be demographic suicide. As Palestinian Authority President Mahmoud Abbas himself has admitted, asking the Jewish state to repatriate 5 million Palestinians "would mean the end of Israel."
UNRWA's warts notwithstanding, American taxpayers have rewarded it year after year. In the 2011 fiscal year, U.S. assistance to UNRWA stood at $249.4 million. Total contributions since its founding in 1949 amount to a staggering $4.4 billion.
In recent years, politicians and policy wonks, including one former UNRWA administrator, have called for UNRWA reform. The agency hasn't merely demurred; it has girded for battle. UNRWA set up shop in Washington with two Hill-savvy professionals, despite the fact that its operations are entirely based in the Middle East, anticipating the need for what looks a full-scale lobby effort to defend its mission. The agency even toyed with changing its name last year in an attempt to burnish its image in the West.
UNRWA's time to defend itself has unquestionably arrived. The Kirk amendment would require the secretary of state to report to Congress on how many Palestinians serviced by UNRWA are true refugees from wars past -- those who could prove that they were personally displaced. That number is believed to be closer to 30,000 people. This new tally would then become the focus of America's assistance to UNRWA for refugee issues.
Despite congressional Republicans' current fervor to rein in America's out-of-control debt, the bill's proponents do not call for a full cutoff to the descendants. Rather, they seek to ensure that UNRWA services keep flowing to those who are needy. The United States would simply not view them as refugees -- just people living in the West Bank or Gaza and below the poverty line.
But funding for the future would not be guaranteed. As Kirk's office explains, Congress will soon need to consider tough questions, like whether U.S. taxpayers should be footing the bill for welfare programs in the West Bank and Gaza, or whether such services should be provided by the Palestinian Authority.
The fact that this language has made it to mark-up is nothing short of remarkable. The Israelis have historically avoided locking horns with UNRWA at all costs. In fact, they have quietly lobbied against UNRWA reform in the past. As one Israeli official confided, the Israel Defense Forces don't want to risk being saddled with providing services to the refugees in the West Bank and Gaza should UNRWA unravel. Indeed, one of the Israelis' primary purposes in signing the Oslo Accords and supporting the creation of the Palestinian Authority was to ensure that they were no longer saddled with the responsibility of providing services to the Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza.
But today, with the peace process moribund, if not dead, the Israelis believe that UNRWA reform could serve as a defibrillator of sorts. By tackling one of the toughest challenges of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict without the bedlam that typically accompanies bilateral negotiations, there would theoretically be one less sticking point when the stars align again for diplomacy. Under the leadership of Knesset member Einat Wilf, this idea now has the backing of the prime minister's office, the Ministry of Defense, and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs.
In Washington, a coalition is still forming. Rep. Howard Berman (D- CA), the ranking member of the House Foreign Affairs Committee, broadly backs this idea but has yet to introduce language on the House side. However, bipartisanship may not be enough: The State Department, which pledged an additional $10 million in UNRWA in March, is expected to put up a fight. The legislation would undoubtedly anger some of Washington's Arab allies, and Foggy Bottom tries to avoid that at all costs.
But such grumblings will likely pale in comparison to the expected outcry in the West Bank, Gaza, and the Palestinian refugee camps in neighboring Arab countries. The refugee narrative is a sacred one in Palestinian political culture. Palestinian leaders will not simply table it because Congress passes new legislation. Rather, it's a fair bet they will mobilize. When UNRWA merely mulled a name change in July 2011, Palestinians organized protests and sit-ins. Proposing real changes to UNRWA could even prompt violence.
In short, the Kirk legislation would strip Palestinian the descendants of their political symbolism.It would be a landmark for this generations-old conflict, but whether it paves the way for peace or conflict remains to be seen. There are few more potent symbols of the Palestinian cause. Don't expect Palestinians to give it up easily.
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5)A retired Constitutional lawyer has read the entire proposed healthcare bill. Read his conclusions and pass this on as you wish.
- The Truth About the Health Care Bills - Michael Connelly, Ret. Constitutional Attorney
- Well, I have done it! I have read the entire text of proposed House Bill 3200: The Affordable Health Care Choices Act of 2009. I studied it with particular emphasis from my area of expertise, constitutional law. I was frankly concerned that parts of the proposed law that were being discussed might be unconstitutional. What I found was far worse than what I had heard or expected.
- To begin with, much of what has been said about the law and its implications is in fact true, despite what the Democrats and the media are saying. The law does provide for rationing of health care, particularly where senior citizens and other classes of citizens are involved, free health care for illegal immigrants, free abortion services, and probably forced participation in abortions by members of the medical profession.
- The Bill will also eventually force private insurance companies out of business, and put everyone into a government run system. All decisions about personal health care will ultimately be made by federal bureaucrats, and most of them will not be health care professionals. Hospital admissions, payments to physicians, and allocations of necessary medical devices will be strictly controlled by the government.
- However, as scary as all of that is, it just scratches the surface. In fact, I have concluded that this legislation really has no intention of providing affordable health care choices. Instead it is a convenient cover for the mostmassive transfer of power to the Executive Branch of government that has ever occurred, or even been contemplated If this law or a similar one is adopted, major portions of the Constitution of the United States will effectively have been destroyed.
- The first thing to go will be the masterfully crafted balance of power between the Executive, Legislative, and Judicial branches of the U.S. Government. The Congress will be transferring to the Obama Administration authority in a number of different areas over the lives of the American people, and the businesses they own.
- The irony is that the Congress doesn't have any authority to legislate in most of those areas to begin with! I defy anyone to read the text of the U.S. Constitution and find any authority granted to the members of Congress to regulate health care.
- This legislation also provides for access, by the appointees of the Obama administration, of all of your personal healthcare direct violation of the specific provisions of the 4th Amendment to the Constitution information, your personal financial information, and the information of your employer, physician, and hospital. All of this is a protecting against unreasonable searches and seizures. You can also forget about the right to privacy. That will have been legislated into oblivion regardless of what the 3rd and 4th Amendments may provide...
- If you decide not to have healthcare insurance, or if you have private insurance that is not deemed acceptable to the Health Choices Administrator appointed by Obama, there will be a tax imposed on you. It is called a tax instead of a fine because of the intent to avoid application of the due process clause of the 5th Amendment. However, that doesn't work because since there is nothing in the law that allows you to contest or appeal the imposition of the tax, it is definitely depriving someone of property without the due process of law.
- So, there are three of those pesky amendments that the far left hate so much, out the original ten in the Bill of Rights, that are effectively nullified by this law It doesn't stop there though.
- The 9th Amendment that provides: The enumeration in the Constitution, of certain rights, shall not be construed to deny or disparage others retained by the people;
- The 10th Amendment states: The powers not delegated to theUnited States by the Constitution, nor prohibited by it to the States, are preserved to the States respectively, or to the people. Under the provisions of this piece of Congressional handiwork neither the people nor the states are going to have any rights or powers at all in many areas that once were theirs to control.
- I could write many more pages about this legislation, but I think you get the idea. This is not about health care; it is about seizing power and limiting rights... Article 6 of the Constitution requires the members of both houses of Congress to "be bound by oath or affirmation to support the Constitution." If I was a member of Congress I would not be able to vote for this legislation or anything like it, without feeling I was violating that sacred oath or affirmation. If I voted for it anyway, I would hope the American people would hold me accountable.
- For those who might doubt the nature of this threat, I suggest they consult the source, theUS Constitution, and Bill of Rights. There you can see exactly what we are about to have taken from us.
- Michael Connelly
- Retired attorney,
- Constitutional Law Instructor
- Carrollton , Texas
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6) Why is the U.S. doing Special Ops exercise with Egypt and Pakistan?
By Shoshana Bryen
NATO's snub of Israel — a “major non-NATO ally” and member of NATO's Mediterranean Dialogue — in its Chicago summit this weekend was simply waved away. “Israel is neither a participant in ISAF nor in KFOR (Afghanistan and Kosovo missions),” said NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen. Israel didn't belong there, and that's that. In the same press conference, however, Rasmussen acknowledged that thirteen other “partner” nations would attend because “[i]n today's world security challenges know no borders, and no country or alliance can deal with most of them on their own.”
Perhaps he, or someone, believes that Israel has nothing to contribute to meeting “today's security challenges.”
Pundits quickly assumed that Turkey — a full NATO member — had vetoed Israel's participation, as it vetoed IDF participation in NATO exercises in the Mediterranean. Rasmussen denied it — and maybe he's right, because that's not the only place where Israel is having trouble with its presumed military partners.
The Obama administration claims a special relationship with Israel. The State Department says the “security relationship with Israel is broader, deeper, and more intense than ever before.” Assistant Secretary of Sate Andrew Shapiro told a Washington audience, “One of my primary responsibilities is to preserve Israel's Qualitative Military Edge [QME][.]“ QME is generally defined as Israel's ability to defeat any likely constellation of conventionally armed adversaries.
And yet…
The U.S. and Israel were to have combined thousands of soldiers in April for what had been billed as the largest missile defense exercise in Israel's history. The objective was to “create a high level of interoperability so that, if needed, US missile defense systems would be able to work with Israeli systems during a conflict.” The exercise was canceled amid conflicting accounts having to do with funding, not wanting to alarm Iran, and “administrative issues.”
But while “Austere Challenge” was being back-burnered, the U.S. was moving forward with plans for a Special Operations exercise in Jordan. Special Operations is the cream of the American military — a joint force, highly trained to do “special” things. Its own website notes that its job is in part to “Deter, Disrupt & Defeat Terrorist Threats” and to “Obtain Persistent Intelligence, Surveillance & Reconnaissance Systems.” Operating in small groups in hostile environments, Special Operators is known for its speed and lethality.
Counterterrorism operatives and terrorist operatives alike covet their skills because to have the skills goes a long way toward defeating them in others. So with whom are we sharing capabilities, some of which were developed and enhanced in cooperation with Israel?
Operation “Eager Lion 2012″ comprises 12,000 soldiers from 19 countries — including several at war with Israel, and at least two with which the U.S. has serious security problems.
Major General Ken Tovo, head of the U.S. Special Operations Forces, told reporters in Amman, “The message that I want to send through this exercise is that we have developed the right partners throughout the region and across the world … insuring that we have the ability to … meet challenges that are coming to our nations.”
The “right partners” include Egypt — with a Muslim Brotherhood-dominated government that said the Israel-Egypt peace treaty should be revoked (on its better-behaved days, it just says “considered dead”) and whose money Congress tied to improvements in human rights and civil society before Secretary of State Clinton overrode their restrictions. Pakistan is also a “right partner.” This would be the Pakistan that has refused to allow NATO to move supplies into Afghanistan for the past six months and hosted Osama bin Laden, and in whose country the U.S. is conducting a drone war in defiance of the Pakistani parliament. Lebanon, where the Cabinet is dominated by Iranian-backed Hezb'allah and which had its military aid from the U.S. suspended after a Lebanese soldier fired into Israel, killing an IDF officer, is a “right partner.” So is Bahrain, which is engaged in low-level and brutal suppression of its Shiite population. So is Iraq.
Jordan itself has a peace treaty with Israel, but the country trains Palestinian police (the nascent Palestinian army). What tactics will Jordan share with Palestinians, whose aim is the destruction of Israel? Palestinians used their earlier U.S. training during the 2000-2004 terrorist war against Israel, and U.S. training of Palestinian troops was suspended (temporarily) after the brutal Palestinian civil war of 2007.
The United States needs allies in an increasingly unstable Middle East. Israel is an ally by the capabilities it brings to the relationship and by its democratic values. Certain other countries can be partners as well. But if the U.S. is going to share counterterrorism capabilities with Israel's enemies in pursuit of other objectives, rhetorical support for Israel is insufficient compensation. The United States should not have allowed Israel to be snubbed by NATO, and should have ensured that U.S.-Israel security cooperation was a high and visible priority for our own benefit as well as for Israel's security.
6a)US Strategy: stop Israel, not Iran
By Vic Rosenthal
Pictured left – Ayatollah Khameini(Photo Credit: Screenshot)
On Friday, the NY Times — which often speaks for the Obama Administration — published an article about the ongoing nuclear negotiations with Iran. There is a message between the lines, and it is not very well hidden. Here are a few excerpts with added emphasis, in case it isn’t obvious:
With signs that Iran is under more pressure than it has been in years to make a deal, senior Obama administration officials said the United States and five other major powers were prepared to offer a package of inducements to obtain a verifiable agreement to suspend its efforts to enrich uranium closer to weapons grade…
The major powers’ initial goal is to halt the activity that most alarms Israel: the spinning of thousands of centrifuges to enrich uranium to 20 percent purity, which is within striking distance of the level needed to fuel a nuclear weapon. That would buy time for negotiations…
For President Obama, the stakes are huge. A successful meeting could prolong the diplomatic dance with Tehran, delaying any possible military confrontation over the nuclear program until after the presidential election. It could also keep a lid on oil prices, which fell again this week in part because of the decrease in tensions. Lower gasoline prices would aid the economic recovery in the United States, and Mr. Obama’s electoral prospects…
On Tuesday, the American ambassador to Israel, Daniel B. Shapiro, sought to reassure an Israeli audience that the United States not only was willing to use military force to prevent Iran from acquiring a nuclear weapon, but had made preparations to do so…
Analysts said it was hard to gauge what kinds of concessions from the Western nations, Russia and China would draw a positive response from Iran, beyond lifting the oil embargo. European officials have suggested that the European Union could suspend a ban on insuring oil tankers that has had a far swifter effect on Iran’s sales elsewhere in the world than originally intended.
There is lots more, but that is more than enough. Is the message clear? If not, I’ll spell it out:
There is lots more, but that is more than enough. Is the message clear? If not, I’ll spell it out:
1). The immediate problem, in the view of the Obama Administration, is that Israel might attack Iran, causing a spike in gas prices in the US and hurting the President’s chances for re-election. The Iranian program itself is a longer-term issue.
2). Anything that can delay a confrontation is ‘good’. Negotiations can be used to stay Israel’s hand, not so much by holding out hope for a solution, but by undercutting support for Israel if she should attack while they are going on.
3). Any kind of agreement with the Iranians, whether or not it is tough enough to be effective, will also isolate Israel if she chooses to attack.
4). The strategy for obtaining agreement, rather than increasing pressure on Iran, will be to make concessions, even reducing those sanctions which have proven effective. Since Iran and the administration have a common interest in preventing an attack, the administration can be hopeful that they will be ‘successful’.
Although the US has stressed that contingency plans for an American raid exist, the Iranians know that nothing short of a public test of a nuclear device could make it happen before the election (even that is uncertain). In the meantime, Iran hopes to push its program to the point that it will be immune to an Israeli attack. The regime is confident that it can stay behind the American red line after that, while still obtaining a capability to assemble weapons in a very short time frame.
Placing concessions on the table before serious negotiations even begin will be read as a sign of weakness. And the P5+1 (US, Britain, France, Russia, China, Germany) demands are below what Israel considers the minimum to guarantee that Iran will not get a weapon. For example, Israel wants the Fordow enrichment facility dismantled, while the P5+1 only asks for activities there to stop. And this is before the hard bargaining.
These negotiations will not enhance Israel’s security. Rather, they will do the opposite. They represent a strategy of appeasement rather than the use of power. What should happen is that the West should deliver a credible ultimatum to fully dismantle the program or face sharply increased sanctions — or, ultimately, military action. Instead, they have chosen to weaken sanctions and to try to remove the only real military threat!
The fact that the negotiations are being conducted without the presence of the one party that is most threatened has a whiff of Chamberlain’s 1938 about it.
6b)U.S. official: IAEA, Iran nuclear deal doesn't spell end of American pressure
In a first official reaction to the emerging deal between Iran and the United Nations' nuclear watchdog, U.S. officials made it clear Tuesday that while the reported agreement was a positive sign, it did not mean Washington intended to let up its pressure on the Islamic Republic over its continued nuclear program.
6b)U.S. official: IAEA, Iran nuclear deal doesn't spell end of American pressure
State Department spokesperson says UN-led talks are only one of two tracks on Iran issue, adding Tehran still required to take concrete steps to alleviate concerns regarding its nuclear program.
In a first official reaction to the emerging deal between Iran and the United Nations' nuclear watchdog, U.S. officials made it clear Tuesday that while the reported agreement was a positive sign, it did not mean Washington intended to let up its pressure on the Islamic Republic over its continued nuclear program.
Referring to the reported IAEA-Iran deal, U.S. State Department spokeswoman Victoria Nuland said, "Obviously, we fully support IAEA efforts to try to resolve the outstanding issues," adding that the administration's "understanding is that they are still working on the precise terms."
However, Nuland made it clear that "the announcement of the deal is one thing, but the implementation is what we're going to be looking for, for Iran to truly follow through and provide the access to all of the locations, the documents and the personnel that the IAEA requires in order to determine whether Iran's program is exclusively for peaceful purposes."
She added that the U.S. was "looking for Iran to demonstrate unequivocally that its program is peaceful. There are separate but linked tracks for doing that."
"One is to do what the IAEA needs, to demonstrate it has seen all the locations and all of the documents. The other is to work with the EU three plus three on concrete steps to give more reassurance of the kind that we're seeking," Nuland added.
Nuland said that she didn’t think "we see them as part and parcel of the effort that we're looking for on the part of Iran," adding that the Iranian regime needs to provide results on both the IAEA track and the Baghdad talks.
Honing in on the emerging deal, Nuland said that what "the IAEA is involved in is verifying, on behalf of the international community, that the things that Iran is saying are true, are actually true. So in the context of any kind of an understanding that might be reached in the EU three plus three context, you would still want the IAEA to be able to verify the implementation of all of those things."
Also Tuesday, White House spokesman Jay Carney called the IAEA agreement with Iran "a step in the right direction," but said the U.S. would "make judgments about Iran's behavior based on actions, not just promises or agreements."
He added that the U.S. would continue to put pressure on Iran and planned to move ahead with sanctions. "We're not at the stage of negotiating what Iran would get in return for fulfillment of its obligations, beyond the general principle, which is they would be able to rejoin the community of nations," he said.
Also commenting on news of an upcoming deal, U.S. President Barack Obama's former senior advisor Dennis Ross, currently a fellow at the Washington Institute for Near East Policy, indicated that the negotiations taking place are designed to maintain pressure on the Iranians, as opposed to letting it up.
"It sends them a message that they can't play for time - the Iranians shouldn't have any illusions they can do minimum and get maximum in return," he said, adding however that he didn't believe talks in Baghdad mark a "make or break" moment.
"It's unrealistic to see a breakthrough at this point after only two rounds of talks, the process has to be much more continuous", he said, adding, "There has to be an indication on substance or the nature of the process. Since the window of opportunity won't be open forever, the sooner we understand what kind of process we are in, the better."
"Suspension of enrichment is something that stops the clock and provides space and time to tackle the issue of the nuclear program. Another track could be changing the character of the program - having nuclear civil power will require firewalls that will ensure it cannot be translated to nuclear weapons capability."
Ross said the Obama administration's position is not to accept limited enrichment - but he also rejected the notion of the need to provide a clear red line. "One has to be careful about the red lines - because historically others think everything is allowed up to the red line," he said.
He added that the U.S. administration stays in close contact with the Israeli leadership on this matter. "It's no coincidence [Israel's Defense Minister Ehud] Barak came to visit Washington last week. I am sure the goal of this visit was to be a part of this discussion. Israeli positions have some impact on ours and there is no intention to surprise."
Also on Tuesday, Chairman of the House Foreign Affairs Committee Ileana Ros-Lehtinen commended the Senate's approval of Iran sanctions on Monday, echoing the skepticism expressed by the Israeli leadership ahead of the Baghdad meeting.
"I am deeply concerned that the so-called agreement reached between Iran and the IAEA will only be used as yet another stalling tactic to afford the Iranian regime greater time to acquire nuclear weapons capabilities", she said, adding, "It's deja vu all over again."
Ros-Lehtinen said that it had been "ten years since Iran's covert nuclear program was discovered by the IAEA, after decades had gone by when the regime successfully hid its nuclear activities from the world."
"It has been ten years of manipulation by Tehran of international inspections. And for decades, the regime has ignored its international obligations. Yet, the IAEA seems content to give Iran a pass in exchange for yet more empty promises. Fortunately, Congress has not bought into this dangerous and foolhardy approach. I am gratified that the Senate finally passed its Iran sanctions legislation, although I am concerned that the legislation is not strong enough," she added.
U.S., Israel 'on same page' ahead of talks
The Obama administration will dispatch a delegation of senior officials to nuclear talks with Iran that are scheduled to resume on Wednesday in Baghdad, according to well-placed sources in the U.S.
The delegation will coordinate U.S. positions with Israel in the talks, and will also try to allay Israeli concerns about possible compromises that the P5+1 group might be willing to make in the talks with Tehran. This was also one of the objectives of the discussions held Tuesday between a senior delegation of the Conference of Presidents of Major Jewish Organizations and several high-ranking administration officials, led by Vice President Joe Biden.
Biden and other officials told the delegation, led by Conference Chairman Richard Stone and its CEO, Malcolm Hoenlein, that the U.S. is in constant contact with its Israeli counterparts in the Defense Ministry and in the Foreign Ministry, and that the U.S. is “on the same page” with Israel concerning the demands from Tehran.
The Americans, led by Biden, reaffirmed the U.S. commitment to prevent Tehran from “developing or purchasing” a nuclear weapons, although they were vague on their position concerning the prevention of Iranian “capability” to produce weapons, and they refrained from getting into the details of the how much nuclear enrichment Iran could continue and under what conditions.
Well-placed observers said the administration seeks to “lower the volume” of Israeli criticism of the negotiations, especially as these “haven’t moved anywhere yet.” The delegation and the messages to the Conference delegation are meant to allay Israeli concerns, the sources said.
In addition to the vice president, the Conference delegates met with Denis McDonough, Deputy National Security Advisor; Thomas Nides, Deputy Secretary of State; Steven Simon, Senior Director for Middle East and North Africa at the National Security Council; David Cohen, Undersecretary of Treasury for Terrorism & Financial Intelligence; John Cohen, Principal Deputy Coordinator for Counterterrorism, Department of Homeland Security; and Jarrod Bernstein, White House Director of Jewish Outreach.
7)-Roubini: $600 Billion Hole Will Push US Into 'Nasty Recession
By Forrest Jones
The number of fiscal expirations slated for 2013 will create a $600 billion hole that plunges the nation into “a nasty recession,” says New York University economist Nouriel Roubini.
At the end of this year, tax cuts are set to expire while automatic spending cuts kick in, a combination dubbed by Wall Street as a "fiscal cliff" that could siphon hundreds of billions out of the economy and offset any growth the economy may post.
"The point is, all this is expiring at year end, and the hole will be $600 billion, or about 4 percent of GDP, and then we plunge into a nasty recession," Roubini says tells CNBC's Maria Bartiromo's One on One column in USA Today.
"Some items may be continued (if the Republicans and Democrats can agree to extend) but a realistic assessment is a fiscal drag," says Roubini.
Meanwhile, he warns that the U.S. economy is currently growing below what it should be, barely on track to hit 2 percent.
"We have positive economic growth, but it's below trend — barely 2 percent," Roubini says.
While the private sectors and households have paid down debts, the government needs to follow suit.
"Job creation is still anemic. The recovery is still anemic because the painful process of de-leveraging has not even started in the public sector. And next year there will be some fiscal drag because of the fiscal cliff that's coming up."
The Federal Reserve, meanwhile has pointed out that Congress and the White House must act to address the country's fiscal imbalance.
"If agreement is not reached on a plan for the federal budget, a sharp fiscal tightening could occur at the start of 2013," the Federal Reserve says in the minutes from its most recent monetary policy meeting.
"Several participants indicated that uncertainty about the trajectory of future fiscal policy could lead businesses to defer hiring and investment. It was noted that agreement on a longer-term plan to address the country's fiscal challenges would help to alleviate uncertainty and consequent negative effects on consumer and business sentiment.
"Some items may be continued (if the Republicans and Democrats can agree to extend) but a realistic assessment is a fiscal drag," says Roubini.
Meanwhile, he warns that the U.S. economy is currently growing below what it should be, barely on track to hit 2 percent.
"We have positive economic growth, but it's below trend — barely 2 percent," Roubini says.
While the private sectors and households have paid down debts, the government needs to follow suit.
"Job creation is still anemic. The recovery is still anemic because the painful process of de-leveraging has not even started in the public sector. And next year there will be some fiscal drag because of the fiscal cliff that's coming up."
The Federal Reserve, meanwhile has pointed out that Congress and the White House must act to address the country's fiscal imbalance.
"If agreement is not reached on a plan for the federal budget, a sharp fiscal tightening could occur at the start of 2013," the Federal Reserve says in the minutes from its most recent monetary policy meeting.
"Several participants indicated that uncertainty about the trajectory of future fiscal policy could lead businesses to defer hiring and investment. It was noted that agreement on a longer-term plan to address the country's fiscal challenges would help to alleviate uncertainty and consequent negative effects on consumer and business sentiment.
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8)Obama changes mind on Pakistan invite to NATO summit --- and then gets dissed by country's president
By David S. Cloud and Kathleen Hennessey
Highly public gamble failed
When the White House sent a last-minute invitation for Asif Ali Zardari to attend the two-day NATO summit, they were taking a highly public gamble. Would sharing the spotlight with President Barack Obama and other global leaders induce the Pakistan president to allow vital supplies to reach alliance troops fighting in Afghanistan?
But long before the summit ended Monday, the answer was clear: No deal.
Zardari's refusal to re-open the supply routes left a diplomatic blot on a summit that NATO sought to cast as the beginning of the end of the conflict in Afghanistan. The Chicago gathering did produce a formal agreement by the alliance to hand over lead responsibility for security to Afghan forces by mid-2013, and pull out nearly all U.S. and other NATO troops by the end of 2014 even if the Taliban-led insurgency remains undiminished.
U.S. officials insist ample fuel and other supplies are being delivered via much longer and more expensive land routes in Russia and other nations north of Afghanistan. But the Pentagon says re-opening the land route in Pakistan will be essential to hauling vast stores of military equipment and vehicles out of Afghanistan during the withdrawal.
Obama's irritation at the impasse was clear Monday when he addressed more than 50 world leaders and publicly thanked Russia and Central Asian nations "that continue to provide critical transit" of war supplies into Afghanistan. Zardari sat only a few feet away, but Obama pointedly did not mention Pakistan.
Later at a news conference that closed the two-day summit, Obama did not try to downplay the strains in a relationship that has spiraled from crisis to crisis since U.S. Navy SEALS secretly flew into Pakistan to kill Osama bin Laden last May. Nor did Obama suggest, as his aides had done earlier, that a quick resolution was likely.
"I don't want to paper over real challenges there," Obama said. "There's no doubt that there have been tensions between (the NATO military coalition) and Pakistan, the United States and Pakistan over the last several months."
Pakistan closed the main NATO supply route after U.S. airstrikes hit two border posts Nov. 26 and killed 24 Pakistani soldiers. Islamabad has demanded an unconditional apology, and more than $5,000 per truck, up from about $250 in the past, to let supplies flow again. The Obama administration has refused to apologize, saying both sides committed mistakes, and said the new truck toll is far too expensive.
The White House was careful not to let Zardari appear completely snubbed Monday, worried that could escalate tensions. Obama had ruled out a formal meeting with Zardari when it was clear no deal was forthcoming, but aides ensured that the Pakistani leader managed to bump into Obama twice Monday, once for a brief one-on-one chat and later with Afghan President Hamid Karzai. The White House quickly told the media of the encounter and tweeted a photo of the three leaders in conversation.
Obama indicated the discussion was far from substantive, however, describing it as "very brief as we were walking into the summit."
Obama also offered a glimpse into how his thinking has evolved on the use of military force during his three years in office, reflecting on an issue that officials have said increasingly has been on his mind — the tensions that develop when U.S. troops are deployed in distant wars for years on end.
"Frankly, the large footprint that we have in Afghanistan over time can be counterproductive," Obama said. "We've been there 10 years. And I think, you know, no matter how much good we're doing and how outstanding our troops and our civilians and diplomats are doing on the ground, 10 years in a country that's very different, that's a strain. Not only on our folks, but also on that country."
Obama dismissed the notion that the U.S. may be planning for a "premature withdrawal" in Afghanistan, but he also committed to the 2014 timetable regardless of whether the Taliban-led insurgency is defeated. Signaling the shrunken ambitions for the mission, Obama said sometimes you just have to pick a time and leave.
"I don't think that there's ever going to be an optimal point where we say, 'This is all done. This is perfect. This is just the way we wanted it. And now we can wrap up all our equipment and go home,' " he said. "There's a process. And it's sometimes a messy process. Just as it was in Iraq."
Obama indicated that he was so wary of major troop commitments that he had applied clear limits for U.S. special operations and other military units battling groups affiliated with al-Qaida in Yemen, Somalia and other places. The goal, Obama said, is to "stay focused on the counterterrorism issue, to not overextend ourselves."
NATO announced last week that it had invited Zardari to the long-planned summit. U.S. officials said they had hoped a meeting with Obama might provide an incentive for a deal on resuming supply shipments. When that strategy did not work, they tried to raise the pressure through what appeared a series of carefully calibrated slights.
"The invitation was an inducement to get them back into the international fold," said a senior U.S. official, speaking anonymously because of the sensitive issues. "But the Pakistanis couldn't get their own act together" in time for the summit. "The main issue, it seems, is money."
Pakistan's ambassador to the United States, Sherry Rehman, sought to downplay the dispute during an evening news conference at Chicago's Ritz Carlton Hotel.
"We are seeking to narrow differences," she said, adding, "I don't think there is a haggle going on with the price."
Farhatullah Babar, a spokesman for Zardari, said negotiations to reopen the supply route were ongoing, but "no timeline can be given."
Earlier, the Pentagon had announced that Defense Secretary Leon E. Panetta had "expressed his deep appreciation" to officials from Kazakhstan, the Kyrgyz Republic, Tajikistan, Turkmenistan and Uzbekistan at a meeting Monday. NATO has trucked more than half its non-lethal supplies through those countries since the Pakistani route closed, and flown the rest in on cargo planes.
Some U.S. officials said the Obama administration's approach could backfire by humiliating Zardari, leaving him politically weaker and even less able to overcome the intense anti-U.S. feeling in Pakistan over the attack on the border posts, years of lethal CIA drone attacks on Pakistani territory, and other divisive issues.
Without access to Pakistan, equipment leaving Afghanistan would have to go by cargo plane and by the northern routes, which stretch thousands of miles through Russia and Central Asia to ports on the Baltic Sea or through Georgia to the Black Sea. Many of the countries refuse to permit the U.S. to ship ammunition and other lethal equipment through their territory, forcing those supplies to go by air.
The U.S. military and NATO allies shipped about 260,000 tons of non-lethal supplies into Afghanistan last year. About 40 percent went through Pakistan, although that had dropped to about 30 percent by last fall.
Before the summit adjourned, officials said additional countries had promised in closed-door discussions to provide money for Afghanistan's army and police after 2014. The Obama administration has sought to raise about $1.3 billion in annual contributions from allies as part of a plan to provide $4.1 billion to Afghanistan's security forces after foreign troops withdraw.
The U.S. has promised $2.4 billion and Afghanistan has offered $500 million. British Prime Minister David Cameron said Australia, Denmark, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, and Estonia and others had made pledges Monday that added "almost" $1 billion. He said more pledges were expected soon.
To understand the fundamental fraudulence of Barack Obama, consider just one issue: his relationship with lobbyists.
In arguably the most important speech of the campaign, the Jefferson-Jackson dinner in Iowa in 2007, Obama said, “[Lobbyists] have not funded my campaign, they will not work in my White House.…” Upon taking office, Obama made quite a show of announcing new ethics rules barring lobbyists from working in the administration on issues that fell under their lobbying bailiwick. Yet Obama immediately allowed waivers for lobbyists working on issues that fell under their lobbying bailiwick.
But that’s not all. During the 2008 campaign, Obama said this:
I intend to tell the corporate lobbyists that their days of setting the agenda in Washington are over, that they had not funded my campaigns, and from my first day as president, I will launch the most sweeping ethics reform in U.S. history. We will make government more open, more accountable and more responsive to the problems of the American people.
When speaking about the destructive power of lobbyists in a town hall meeting in Bristol, Virginia, Obama was emphatic: ““We are going to change how Washington works. They will not run our party. They will not run our White House. They will not drown out the views of the American people.” And in August, 2008, Obama said this: ““I suffer from the same original sin of all politicians, which is we’’ve got to raise money. But my argument has been and will continue to be that the disproportionate influence of lobbyists and special interest is a problem in Washington and in state capitals.”
Now let’s judge Obama’s words against his actions, with the help of a Washington Poststory.
Here’s how the story begins:
Before 9 a.m., a group of lobbyists began showing up at the White House security gates with the chief executives of their companies, all of whom serve on President Obama’s jobs council, to be checked in for a roundtable with the president. At 1 p.m., a dozen representatives from the meat industry arrived for a briefing in the New Executive Office Building. At 3 p.m., a handful of lobbyists were lining up for a ceremony honoring the 2011 World Series champions, the St. Louis Cardinals. And at 4 p.m., a lobbyist for Goldman Sachs arrived in the Old Executive Office Building for a meeting with Alan B. Krueger, chairman of the Council of Economic Advisers.It was an unremarkable January day, with a steady stream of lobbyists among the thousands of daily visitors to the White House and the surrounding executive office buildings, according to a Washington Post analysis of visitor logs released by the administration… The visitor logs for Jan. 17 – one of the most recent days available – show that the lobbying industry Obama has vowed to constrain is a regular presence at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave. The records also suggest that lobbyists with personal connections to the White House enjoy the easiest access.
Now hypocrisy is not an unknown quality in a politician. But what sets Obama apart from almost everyone else is the lengths Obama goes to in order to portray himself as morally superior to the rest of the political class even as he acts in ways that completely shatter his claims. He reminds me of the minister who cannot help from condemning the very sin to which he is beholden. And so as recently as last month Obama was saying, “A lot of folks see the amounts of money that are being spent and the special interests that dominate and the lobbyists that always have access, and they say to themselves, maybe I don’t count.”
What’s impossible to know is the degree to which Obama is alarmingly cynical or the degree to which he is alarmingly self-deluded. Whatever the case, he is a man whose words mean nothing. Nothing at all.
8b) Big Lies in Politics
The fact that so many successful politicians are such shameless liars is not only a reflection on them, it is also a reflection on us. When the people want the impossible, only liars can satisfy them, and only in the short run. The current outbreaks of riots in Europe show what happens when the truth catches up with both the politicians and the people in the long run.
Among the biggest lies of the welfare states on both sides of the Atlantic is the notion that the government can supply the people with things they want but cannot afford. Since the government gets its resources from the people, if the people as a whole cannot afford something, neither can the government.
There is, of course, the perennial fallacy that the government can simply raise taxes on "the rich" and use that additional revenue to pay for things that most people cannot afford. What is amazing is the implicit assumption that "the rich" are all such complete fools that they will do nothing to prevent their money from being taxed away. History shows otherwise.
After the Constitution of the United States was amended to permit a federal income tax, in 1916, the number of people reporting taxable incomes of $300,000 a year or more fell from well over a thousand to fewer than three hundred by 1921.
Were the rich all getting poorer? Not at all. They were investing huge sums of money in tax-exempt securities. The amount of money invested in tax-exempt securities was larger than the federal budget, and nearly half as large as the national debt.
This was not unique to the United States or to that era. After the British government raised their income tax on the top income earners in 2010, they discovered that they collected less tax revenue than before. Other countries have had similar experiences. Apparently the rich are not all fools, after all.
In today's globalized world economy, the rich can simply invest their money in countries where tax rates are lower.
So, if you cannot rely on "the rich" to pick up the slack, what can you rely on? Lies.
Nothing is easier for a politician than promising government benefits that cannot be delivered. Pensions such as Social Security are perfect for this role. The promises that are made are for money to be paid many years from now -- and somebody else will be in power then, left with the job of figuring out what to say and do when the money runs out and the riots start.
There are all sorts of ways of postponing the day of reckoning. The government can refuse to pay what it costs to get things done. Cutting what doctors are paid for treating Medicare patients is one obvious example.
That of course leads some doctors to refuse to take on new Medicare patients. But this process takes time to really make its full impact felt -- and elections are held in the short run. This is another growing problem that can be left for someone else to try to cope with in future years.
Increasing amounts of paperwork for doctors in welfare states with government-run medical care, and reduced payments to those doctors, in order to stave off the day of bankruptcy, mean that the medical profession is likely to attract fewer of the brightest young people who have other occupations available to them -- paying more money and having fewer hassles. But this too is a long-run problem -- and elections are still held in the short run.
Eventually, all these long-run problems can catch up with the wonderful-sounding lies that are the lifeblood of welfare state politics. But there can be a lot of elections between now and eventually -- and those who are good at political lies can win a lot of those elections.
As the day of reckoning approaches, there are a number of ways of seeming to overcome the crisis. If the government is running out of money, it can print more money. That does not make the country any richer, but it quietly transfers part of the value of existing money from people's savings and income to the government, whose newly printed money is worth just as much as the money that people worked for and saved.
Printing more money means inflation -- and inflation is a quiet lie, by which a government can keep its promises on paper, but with money worth much less than when the promises were made.
Is it so surprising voters with unrealistic hopes elect politicians who lie about being able to fulfill those hopes?
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