Obama, and the "First 100 Days"

Every day you learn something new...

As the liberal media prattles on about Obama's "first 100 days" in office, and all the things he is expected to do/change/elevate/eliminate/excavate/deliberate, let's take a look at where that phrase originated, and how it ended up on day 100:

Not yet a third of the way through the president's "first 100 days," he and we should remember that it was not FDR's initial burst of activity in 1933 that put the phrase "100 days" into the Western lexicon.

It was Napoleon's frenetic trajectory in 1815 that began with his escape from Elba and ended near the Belgian village of Waterloo.

Hmmm....and we know how much history loves to repeat istelf...

The Obama Tax Cut: $13 Dollars Per Week !

...and that's max. I sh*t you not:

Q: What are some of the tax breaks in the bill?

A: It includes Obama's signature "Making Work Pay" tax credit for 95 percent of workers, though negotiators agreed to trim the credit to $400 a year instead of $500 — or $800 for married couples, cut from Obama's original proposal of $1,000. It would begin showing up in most workers' paychecks in June as an extra $13 a week in take-home pay, falling to about $8 a week next January.

That's not even going to nearly close enough to cover all the additional taxes and fees that are about to be piled on our everyday lives. Give us $13, take $130. Is it the government, or a tightly-wound Atlantic City slot machine?

At least the slot doesn't force you to insert cash, under penalty of law...

One Silly Kid, And Some Wiser Americans

I'm referring to the kid at Barack Obama's "town hall" the other day -

It was quite a moment at the end of President Obama's town hall meeting in Fort Myers, Fla., yesterday. As The News-Press writes, 19-year-old Julio Osegueda "rocketed from a Cape Coral teenager who flips burgers for $7.85 an hour at a McDonald's to an instant celebrity of sorts."

..because he asked Obama for a better job. Savior-based economy, indeed. Anyway - the kid gets another gig - kinda:

(He) picked up another job -- if just for a day -- as the color announcer for the Fort Myers Miracle baseball team's radio broadcast for its home opener April 10. The one-day gig typically pays $25, but the Miracle said the salary is negotiable.

Osegueda said after his encounter with The One: "Yes, I was. I was truly blessed".

I went to the comment section, ready to puke at the thought of the Obama-love that would be pouring forth. Instead, I get....multiple doses of common sense?

-So, can I assume that we'll treat him the way 'Joe the Plumber' was?
I'll look forward to reading this kid's tax returns and other dirty laundry soon.

-If I were his parent I would be in hiding today. He looked foolish and immature; he showed disrespect to an empoyer who has done a lot for workers his age...the ultimate lunacy was the belief that control over benefits in a very successful company that NEVER will need a bailout should be managed by the Executive Branch.

-This looks like the method Obama used to get elected. Say pointless, crowd pleasing words to inspire weak-minded minimum wage youth to follow his Jonesian(Jim) path. A job for 25.00? One time? Sounds like our recovery plan.

-I hope this is supposed to be funny...

Maybe there still is hope for change!

Why Can We Be More Like Enlightened Europe?

Remember, this is where the Democrats and Barack Obama want to take us...but the policies of fear and loathing always lead to outcomes like this:

The Anti-Defamation League said Tuesday that a survey it commissioned found nearly a third of Europeans polled blame Jews for the global economic meltdown and that a greater number think Jews have too much power in the business world.

It says that in Spain, 74 percent of those asked say they feel it is "probably true" that Jews hold too much sway over the global financial markets. That is the highest percentage in the survey.
Nearly two-thirds of Spanish respondents said Jews were more loyal to Israel than they were to their home countries.

In total, about 40 percent of those questioned said Jews have too much power in the business world, including more than half of Hungarian, Spanish and Polish respondents. And 44 percent said they believe it is "probably true" that Jews still talk too much about the Holocaust.

Maybe because of surveys like these?

But based on Obama's recent remarks, in America, Republicans are the new Jews - loyal to money and not their country, responsible for all the nation's ills, and blocking the way to a better tomorrow.

How soon until they start to herd us up?

TIME Magazine's anti-Israel Jihad Continues !

Fresh off of such "how soon can we bury the Jewish state" peices such as "Can Israel Survive Its Assault on Gaza?"(so what do you think now, fellas?), we get this beauty:

Israel election result offers little hope for Mideast peace

Today's Israeli leaders have a fuzzy vision and lack the means to implement much of anything. Kadima founder Ariel Sharon and his successors as party leader Ehud Olmert and Tzipi Livni have all realized that political realities and Palestinian demographics mean Israel can no longer occupy the West Bank and Gaza forever. Yet none of them has put forth a sensible plan for peace with the Palestinians or shown the will to reach a final comprehensive settlement.

Although Olmert and Livni resumed Israel's peace negotiations with the Palestinians, their three-year terms in office as Prime Minister and Foreign Minister, respectively, will be remembered for two senseless wars - the massive assaults on Lebanon and Gaza - that seem to have only strengthened the militant Islamist factions that were targeted in the attacks. Israel's international standing, meanwhile, has been significantly eroded by those wars as well as the nation's halting commitment to peace

Where the hell do you begin with this uneducated, uninformed, piece of garbage masquarading as analysis?

-"Israeli leaders lack vision?" What about the leaders of Hamas - are they to be commended due to their strong loyalty to their vision - the destruction of the Israeli state?

-Hey, geniuses - Israel no longer occupies Gaza. Hasn't for years. There isn't even a single Jew in the joint. Basic current events - can't TIME even get that straight?

-How about the Palestinians putting together a "sensible plan for peace", one that does not involve the slaughter of innocent Jews? I know, I know - those pesky Jews, why won't they just lay down and die already?

-"Senseless wars that have strenghtened Islamic militants"? Hardly...Hezbollah was so cowed by the "failed" Israel-Lebanon war of 2006 that they refused to launch missle one in support of their so-called Palestinian bretheren. And will Hamas actually wind up stronger, after allowing Gaza to be decimated? Unlikely. They're insane, and even the Palestinians are starting to get it. Maybe the writers for TIME are fooled by Hamas' "victory rallies" amongst the rubble, but even the natives have more common sense than a Western journalist.

Notice - barely a jot of responsibility is accorded to the Palestinians in this whole tirade, without it being twisted around and being laid upon the shoulders of Israel. You think - maybe that's part of the problem?

You think - maybe it's journalistic sh*t like this that is putting TIME magazine out of business?

America Turns Against The Stimulus!

Not sure if Obama's return to the campaign trail is gonna have much affect - the American peopel are getting ugly:

With the Senate poised to vote Tuesday on an $827-billion version of the economic recovery plan, 62% of U.S. voters want the plan to include more tax cuts and less government spending.
Just 14% would like to move in the opposite direction with more government spending and fewer tax cuts, according to a new Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey.
Twenty percent (20%) would be happy to pass it pretty much as is, and five percent (5%) are not sure.

Republicans and unaffiliated voters overwhelmingly want to see more tax cuts and less government spending. Democrats are more evenly divided: 42% agree with the Republicans, 32% want to pass the plan as is, and 22% would like to see more government spending and fewer tax cuts.

Will Obama pay heed to the wisdom of the American people, or heel to the words of Paul Krugman, who blames Obama for allowing "centrists" to strip out 1% of the welfare provisions:

The original plan ..included aid to the unemployed, especially help in maintaining health care — cut. Food stamps — cut. All in all, more than $80 billion was cut from the plan.
On the other hand, the centrists were apparently just fine with one of the worst provisions in the Senate bill, a tax credit for home buyers.
But how did this happen? I blame President Obama’s belief that he can transcend the partisan divide.....

Interesting to see if Obama - a notorious resident of "the political bubble" - will make this an "us against them" campaign as declared necessary by the Times' resident village idiot. Based on the poll above, he ought to be quite careful about whose advice he follows...

After all - Porkulus could rise up, like so many movie monsters, and destroy its beloved creators...

All We Have To Fear Is....

...Barack Obama and the Democrats.

Come to think of it, that is a good enough reason to be nervous, as their combination of threats, greed, waste, sloth, and immaturity threatens to destroy a once-great nation:

No one doubts the economy is bad and getting worse. But when the president of the United States stands up and asks us to give in to our fears, to blindly obey his call to pass a bill with tens of billions of dollars in spending that even the bill’s proponents say is wasteful, one has to ask what happened to the party who once told us: “All we have to fear is fear itself.”

Obama does not want Americans to believe in themselves. He wants them to believe in him...

Instead of instilling confidence, Obama is selling fear. Instead of raising us up, he is crushing us with his rank appeal to partisanship. Instead of statesmanship, we get gimmicks like his stimulus bill that the Congressional Budget Office tells us will harm the economy in the long run.

Barack goes back on the campaign trail today, hoping for photo-ops and supportive coverage from a compliant media that will make it seem as if he has tremendous support for "Porkulus":

White House spokesman Robert Gibbs said the meeting would give the president a chance to hear Americans' concerns about the bill, which was set to have a key vote in the Senate on Monday afternoon.

He's going to visit two of the areas hardest-hit by unemployment and foreclosure, so don't expect to see much besides folks with their hands out, demanding more of your money to help them with their problems (damn you and your own).

Will this dog-and-pony show change any minds? We'll have to check those approval ratings, see how much they've slid by Thursday. Meanwhile, someone want to inform Baracky that he's president now, and perhaps he should work to craft these grand compromises he promised?
Or is "work" - something Barack Obama has never done, incidentally - the real problem here?

After all, empty promises on the campaign trail are so much less stressful. And like a druggie hooked on the pipe, it's quite easy to fall back on, too...

Barack Obama: Anti-Christ !

We've touched on this subject before and in greater length, but it's worth revisiting as some members of the mainstream media are starting to stand up and take notice.

E.J. Dionne, in a long and pointless liberal partisan rant, ends his column on a bizarre note:

No occupant of the White House has ever been able to walk on water.

Yeah, but that's not how you pitched him to us, tough guy. Did the Prince of Lies play you for a fool?

He was gonna heal the planet and lower the oceans. So, even if he couldn't walk on water, he should at least be able to paddle in it. "He is a community organizer like Jesus was," said Susan Sarandon, "and now we're a community, and he can organize us."

I'll let Mark Steyn continue here:

So how's that going? Jesus took a handful of loaves and two fish and fed 5,000 people. Barack wants to take a trillion pieces of pork and feed it to a handful of Democratic Party interest groups.

Jesus picked twelve disciples. Barack seems to have gone more for one of those "Dirty Dozen" caper-movie lineups, where the mission is so perilous and so audacious that only the scuzziest lowlifes recruited from every waterfront dive have any chance of pulling it off.

Notice how Obama sees the path that Jesus took, and does everything he can to somehow choose an equal yet opposite path? As the First Book of Wikipedia tells us:

...the Antichrist or anti-Christ means someone recognized as fulfilling the Biblical prophecies about one who will oppose Christ while resembling him in a deceptive manner.

And did you notice that he's turned the heat up in the White House...literally?

The One moves into the White House and promptly cranks up the heat to tropical temperatures... "He likes it warm. You could grow orchids in there.”

Uh-huh. And it's not like this hasn't happened before:

As a matter of fact, we're almost certain ghouls and werewolves occupy high positions at city hall.

Yeah, I know, that was just a movie, but....lies, extreme heat, and demonic opposition to Christ? Boy, I think the phrase "Great Satan" is about to take on a whole new meaning....

John Kerry: Marxist, and Proud Of It!

If it walks like a duck and sounds like a duck, it's...John effin' Kerry:

I've supported many tax cuts over the years, and there are tax cuts in this proposal. But a tax cut is non-targeted.

If you put a tax cut into the hands of a business or family, there's no guarantee that they're going to invest that or invest it in America.

They're free to go invest anywhere that they want if they choose to invest.

So we are free to work, but we should not be free to spend out money. It should be turned over to John Kerry and Nancy Pelosi, for them to spend as they see fit. It is not for us to reason why, just to serve at the whim of Barack Obama, and die (hopefully without extented government-funded medical care).

These people run the country now, folks. Be afraid. Be very afraid.

So Exactly How Big Is The Stimulus Bill?

No one quite seems to know...how encouraging!

Sen. Reid: “Keep in mind, it’s approaching a trillion dollars.”
NYT: even the senators behind the compromise were uncertain of the number.
Roll Call: The uncertainty made it difficult to predict whether the final bill would be approximately $780 billion or $826 billion.
Fox News: about $811 billion in spending and tax cuts
AP: Democrats put the cost of the measure at $780 billion…Republican critics said that the price tag was actually higher…Official cost figures were not yet available.
AFP: The bill's supporters noted that its price tag would be far smaller than the 937 billion dollars… Details were elusive… Republicans said their calculations put the new bill at roughly 830 billion dollars
LAT: a price tag of about $780 billion under the compromise deal, though the final figure was unclear.
Bloomberg: Democrats said the Senate plan totaled $780 billion while Republicans said that didn’t include the cost of additions made on the Senate floor including tax cuts aimed at helping the housing and auto industries.

Well, at least the AP calls it "President Barack Obama's economic recovery plan". Let's see them try to back away from that assertion when it lands in the trash heap of history's Epic Fails...

Barack Obama: "A Man Cornered"

Roger Simon, with an analysis of Barak Obama and his performance to date, some 2 1/2 weeks in:

Barack Obama picked as his spiritual mentor the most execrable of men, a racist even, Reverend Jeremiah Wright. It should have been apparent from that alone that Obama was no judge of character – or, even worse, he simply didn’t care. He was more concerned with his own advancement.

But the country ign ored that as the media papered it over. We are paying for it now – and oh how we are paying! Our president is behaving like a man cornered and not a statesman. Being the president of all Americans has disappeared within two weeks. The idea of reaching out to the other side evidently meant no more than a dinner with George Will and Peggy Noonan.

Our government is dealing with a monumental global economic crisis in a manner that is partisan and idiotic. The Congressional leaders are dimwits and our President seems out of his depth while the future of children is being mortgaged to an incomprehensible extent.

I don't think the media is capable of papering over this for much longer; one can almost feel the tide turning as the American people realize thatthey have been had by a slick-talking con-man and his sidekicks in the mainstream media. Like a tourist suckered into a Three Card Monte game, Obama has just snatched our dough and is already casting his eyes about for the next sacrificial lamb to be burnt on the alter of his ambition.

Can we survive four years of this childishness? Or will he get run out of Washington on a rail, with the partisans chasing him with vats of tar and feathers, as in days of yore?

This is gonna get worse - way, way worse...

No Hope For Change

Especially with a nasty little man like this at the helm:

President Barack Obama is bringing in a team of outside advisers to help steer the economy out of a tailspin, while ridiculing Republicans for clinging to a "losing formula"...

In a feisty speech that sounded like a campaign rally address, Obama took a sharper tone than he has in recent weeks and aggressively challenged Republicans, who voted as a block against the plan in the House and are demanding massive changes to the measure in the Senate.

Obama know how to campaign, alas, he is clueless about how to lead. The Republicans, however, know how to represent, and they are representing the will of the American people in this pitched battle for the future of our republic:

Eighty-one percent of Americans say the stimulus bill should be a bipartisan effort. Just 13 percent think it is okay for a bill to be passed with only the backing of the Democratic majority.

Americans are receptive to Republicans' push to increase the proportion of tax cuts in the stimulus bill: Asked whether higher government spending or tax cuts for business would be more effective in ending the recession, 59 percent choose the tax cuts. Just 22 percent prefer more government spending.

The public is not optimistic about the impact of the economic stimulus bill: Just 21 percent believe it will significantly shorten the recession. An additional 18 percent believe it will shorten the recession slightly. Forty-five percent say it will not shorten the recession at all.

And what is Obama's answer to all this? The Hope of Fear:

"A failure to act, and act now, will turn crisis into a catastrophe." -- President Obama, Feb. 4.

Hopeless...and only 17 days in....

Update: Nastier and Nastier...Change I can say I expected!

A fired-up Barack Obama ditched his TelePrompter to rally House Democrats and rip Republican opponents of his recovery package Thursday night – at one point openly mocking the GOP for failing to follow through on promises of bipartisanship.

This IS change, all right - George W. Bush was never so openly hateful of his political opponents. And who was it that promised to work for bipartisanship, anyway?
Obama is way, way out of his league....and will drag the rest of us down with him.

Ship of Fools

Seems like only two types of people support the animalistic regime in Gaza - peace activists, and journalists. Put them both on one ship and send them off to fight the Israeli Navy, and you've got a movie even the Three Stooges would reject:

The Israeli navy boarded a freighter trying to break the blockade of the Gaza Strip on Thursday and escorted it to the port of Ashdod where 20 passengers were being questioned, the military said.

The military official said the ship's 20 passengers, including 10 journalists, were being questioned.

"Once the questioning is completed we will make a decision on their fate," a military spokesman said.

A military source said the passengers also included a veteran Palestinian rights campaigner, Syrian-born Archbishop Hilarion Capucci of the Melkite Church of the Eastern Rite.

Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said the navy had initially allowed the ship to sail to Egypt but its captain made a sudden U-turn toward Gaza's shore after which the navy boarded the vessel and ordered it to sail to Ashdod.

Qatar-based Al Jazeera television quoted a correspondent aboard the vessel as saying an Israeli navy ship had fired shots and then sailors boarded the Tali and beat passengers and crew.

The army said no gunfire was used in taking control of the vessel and most of the 20 passengers aboard were from media organizations.

So was this simply a media stunt to try to embarrass the Israelis? A Katrina-like attempt to prove that Big Media can do what the government can't ? Or are the MSM simply so emboldened by their hand in Barack Obama's victory (OK, I don't know that there are Americans involved, but still) that they feel that they can face down the might of Israel with impunity?

Gateway Pundit has more. I would love to see a manifest, with the names and organizations to which these "journalists" belonged. Furthermore, I hope that these assclowns were telling the truth when they claimed that Israeli sailors beat the passengers on board.

I only wish I could have joined in the fun...

Heartbreaking

Via Instapundit, Michael Yon reports from the Israeli city of Sderot, where we learn what life is like for a child growing up in the shadow of an Islamist state:

On February 1, 2009, the day of my visit, The International Herald Tribune reported:

At least two rockets and several mortars were fired into Israel on Sunday, lightly wounding two soldiers and a civilian, and Palestinian militants opened fire on an army patrol along the border, causing no injuries, the military said.
Residents said that one of the rockets landed near a kindergarten in an Israeli village east of Gaza but failed to explode.

The playgrounds in Sderot come equipped with bomb shelters, decorated with kid-friendly art. When the alarms sound, the youngsters have 15 seconds to dash, tumble or waddle into a shelter before impact, or risk being torn asunder.

Earsplitting detonations, spewing searing hot steel, must be terrifying for the kids. It is truly sad to imagine that a ten year-old can have more experience diving for cover than many combat experienced soldiers.

According to the “Kassam counter”, as of February 1, 10,046 Kassam rockets have hit Sderot and the Western Negev since 2001. During a single two-week period, 293 rockets rained in on Sderot. According to a pamphlet from the Sderot Information Center, a kindergarten teacher asked her pupils, “Why does the snail have a shell?” The Children answered in chorus, “So it can be protected from the Kassam rockets.”

This is the result of "land for peace". This is the result of bargining with terrorists in good faith. This is the result of a hate-filled Islamic ideology gaining power and international recognition.

May God forever keep them in their 12th century squalor, until they repent of their sick and hateful ways.

"Stimulus Plan" Support Hits "Bushian" Levels !

Can the will of the people defeat "Porkulus"? Rasmussen Reports, I reprint (without permission):

Fifty percent (50%) of U.S. voters say the final economic recovery plan that emerges from Congress is at least somewhat likely to make things worse rather than better...

Most voters currently rate Congress' performance as poor, and most expect that lobbyists will have more influence on the legislation than voters or the president. When reacting to the economic downturn, 46% of Americans remain more concerned that the government will do too much

Here's a split that should suprise no one - Obama's favorite divide of all, that of government employees and the people whom now seem to serve them:

Government employees are the least skeptical of all. Just 26% of those on the public payroll say the legislation is likely to make things worse. However, a majority of entrepreneurs, private sector employees and retirees all think the legislation could end up doing more harm than good.

And guess who's voice is absent from Obama's table? C'mon, how can The One do wrong, with government employees whispering the great truths of the Pork Gods in his ear?

And this about sums it up:

Support for the economic recovery plan working its way through Congress has fallen again this week. For the first time, a plurality of voters nationwide oppose the $800-billion-plus plan.
The latest Rasmussen Reports national telephone survey found that 37% favor the legislation, 43% are opposed, and 20% are not sure.

Obama seems to be part of that "26% on the public payroll", and seems ready to put his mandate behind Porkulus:

Obama rejected several criticisms of the plan...Obama subtly referenced his win in November while arguing that recalcitrant lawmakers need to get behind his approach.

Get used to that 37% figure...it will be Obama's approval rating by Day 100...bet on it.

The Obama Meltdown -Day 14

Well, we (on the right) knew the American people were electing a charlatan, a con man, a hoaxer, a carnival barker, a magician without a trick up his sleeve to the presidency of the United States. But even most of us didn't believe his adminstration - after what the press adoring called the smoothest transistion in memory - would be in complete and utter disarray in such short order.

Victor Davis Hanson spells it out:

We are quite literally after two weeks teetering on an Obama implosion—and with no Dick Morris to bail him out—brought on by messianic delusions of grandeur, hubris, and a strange naivete that soaring rhetoric and a multiracial profile can add requisite cover to good old-fashioned Chicago politicking.

First, there were the sermons on ethics, belied by the appointments of tax dodgers, crass lobbyists, and wheeler-dealers like Richardson—with the relish of the Blago tapes still to come...

Second, was the "stimulus" (the euphemism for "borrow/print money") that was simply a way to go into debt for a generation to shower Democratic constinuencies with cash.

Then third, there were the inflated lectures on historic foreign policy to be made by the clumsy political novice who trashed his own country and his predecessor in the most ungracious manner overseas to a censured Saudi-run press organ ...

Fifth, Gibbs as press secretary is a Scott McClellan nightmare that won't go away... Blaming Fox News for Obama's calamities is McClellan to the core and doesn't work...

Six, Biden is being Biden. Already, he's ridiculed the chief justice, trashed the former VP, bragged on himself ad nauseam in Bidenesque weird ways, and it's only been two weeks.

And the result of all this?

At home, Obama is becoming laughable and laying the groundwork for the greatest conservative populist reaction since the Reagan Revolution.

Abroad, some really creepy people are lining up to test Obama's world view of "Bush did it/but I am the world": The North Koreans are readying their missiles; the Iranians are calling us passive, bragging on nukes and satellites; Russia is declaring missile defense is over and the Euros in real need of iffy Russian gas; Pakistanis say no more drone attacks....

We're in touble, folks, and it's real early in the game? Can Obama turn it around, or will he suck us all down with him?

Hey - at least he's still cool, OK?

The Obama Cabinet: "It's A Circus!"

...missing only that slightly insane merry-go-round music chortling through the pipes. First clown to fall: Nancy Killefer, slated to be "chief performance officer":

Nancy Killefer withdrew her nomination Tuesday to become the Obama administration's chief performance officer, citing unspecified problems with District of Columbia unemployment tax.

... a letter to President Barack Obama, Killefer said her tax issue "could be used to create exactly the kind of distraction and delay those duties must avoid."

Nice "performance" there, Nancy! Way to shift blame onto those pesy "distractors"!

Second clown to go down, a mere three hours later: Tom Daschle, the ultimate limousine liberal -one who won't even pay the taxes on his limousine! Shoot, that's for the little people....

Tom Daschle withdrew his nomination on Tuesday to be President Barack Obama's Health and Human Services secretary, dealing potential blows to both speedy health care reform and Obama's hopes for a smoother start as president.

{like that's a bad thing? - ed}

"I was a little stunned. I thought he was going to get confirmed," said Sen. Max Baucus, D-Mont...

{way to be in touch with the outside world there, Maxie !}

Daschle was the third high-profile Obama nominee to bow out. Obama initially had tapped Bill Richardson to be Commerce secretary, but the New Mexico governor withdrew amid a grand jury investigation into a state contract awarded to his political donors

If it were a Republican administration, the headline would all be about how badly they were struggling out of the gate, and how rapidy they would lose the trust of the American people. But since the media's tounge is deep inside Obama's mouth, all we get is winsome moaning and wire reports...

Here's the kicker, from the Great Changer as he tried earlier to protect Crooked Tom:

"Tom made a mistake, which he has openly acknowledged," Obama said. "He has not excused it, nor do I. But that mistake and this decision cannot diminish the many contributions Tom has made to this country."

If you or I would have made that mistake, we would have gone to prison for it, regardless of our other contributions to society, regardless of how many people may count on us.
But if you are a Democratic insider, all crimes are forgiven. Responsibilty for one's actions is just theory, to be applied to the little people only.
Just ask Charles Rangel....

Barack's Approval Ratings Fading...Fading...

Maybe it's the trillion-dollar "stimulus to nowhere" that is starting to get under people's skin? From a poll run by Democracy Corps:

Q. Do you approve or disapprove of the way Barack Obama is handling his job as president?

Strongly approve 42%
Somewhat approve 13%

That's a combined 55%, down from the 80%+ of inauguration day, and a bulk of this percentage is "somewhat" weak. Maybe it's because people are beginning to read stories like this, where it is speculated (with good reason) that Obama may cut the military's budget while increasing spending on the Nationa Endowment of the Arts?

And here's a poll question people stopped asking as soon as Obama was inagurated:

Q. Generally speaking, do you think that things in this country are going in the right direction, or do you feel things have gotten pretty seriously off on the wrong track?

Right direction - 27%
Wrong track - 65%
(Don't know/refused) - 8%

This poll ran through January 30th, so the Big O had already had a week in office to show the direction he planning on taking the country in....not sure how they match up against Bush-era numbers, but I gotta believe they are not significantly different.

Courage, my Republican representatives. This Obama guy is going down faster than Jimmy Carter on an Islamist terrorist....

UPDATE 2-4: Gateway Pundit reports that Rasmussen has President Obama's approval rating down to 61%. It is a Bushian level; George W. had an approval rating slightly higher 60 days after the much-maligned 2000 election. Where will Obama be when we come to the Ides of March? Expect another Bushian level, this time circa 2008....

Rendition and the Shifting Sands of Morality

So Barack Obama does see wisdom in some of the horrific tools that George W. Bush has used to protect the country from Islamic terrorism:

Under executive orders issued by Obama recently, the CIA still has authority to carry out what are known as renditions, secret abductions and transfers of prisoners to countries that cooperate with the United States. Current and former U.S. intelligence officials said that the rendition program might be poised to play an expanded role going forward because it was the main remaining mechanism — aside from Predator missile strikes — for taking suspected terrorists off the street.

Remember that the European Parliament condemned renditions as "an illegal instrument used by the United States". Didn't Obama vow to make our "former allies" love us again? If so, why would he explicity keep in place the policy of rendition, which has enraged both the Euro-Left and the Hollywood elite?

Here a clue for ya, Jack...the notoriously anti-American, anti-semitic Human Rights Watch held the previous standard on renditions during the Bush Administration:

Repudiate the use of rendition to torture as a counterterrorism tactic and permanently discontinue the CIA's rendition program...

Now, under the Obama regime:

"Under limited circumstances, there is a legitimate place" for renditions, said Tom Malinowski, the Washington advocacy director for Human Rights Watch. "What I heard loud and clear from the president's order was that they want to design a system that doesn't result in people being sent to foreign dungeons to be tortured -- but that designing that system is going to take some time.

An identical act goes from immoral and illegal to understandable and legal, depending not on the circumstances it was committed but by the person committing the act. It's an extension of the Middle East morality test - If the Palestianians target civilians, it is OK, but if Israelis accidentally harm civilians in an act of self-defense, it is a war crime.

Morality doesn't work that way, of course. Morality is making a decision to stand by what is right and good regardless of the consequences and regardless of the opposition. Human Rights Watch's ugly flip-flop here - changing what had been a once-sacred position in order to provide cover for Barack Obama - neutralizes whatever claim they might have to morality in the future.

But isn't this typical of the liberal double-standard? You and I cheat on our taxes, we are immoral and unpatriotic (to use Joe Biden's phrase) and off to the hoosegow we go. Tom Daschle does it, and he gets rewarded with a cabinet post.

Beware of a government that redefines morality in a way that benefits them, to your detriment. It's a way to maintain power, by keeping them above the law while keeping you in fear. How will the sands settle tomorrow in a scoiety where morality changes upon leadership, and upon whims? One does not know, but you can be sure that if those in power can use your morality against you, they will...

Barack Obama Spits On Whitey

Americans in Kentucky die by the dozens in the midst of an unprecedented winter storm, with FEMA nowhere to be found:

We're asking people to pack a suitcase and head south and find a motel if they have the means, because we can't service everybody in our shelter," said Crittenden County Judge-Executive Fred Brown, who oversees about 9,000 people, many of whom are sleeping in the town's elementary school.

Local officials were growing angry with what they said was a lack of help from the state and the Federal Emergency Management Agency. In Grayson County, about 80 miles southwest of Louisville, Emergency Management Director Randell Smith said the 25 National Guardsmen who have responded have no chain saws to clear fallen trees."We've got people out in some areas we haven't even visited yet," Smith said. "We don't even know that they're alive."

Where's FEMA? Do they not respond when anymore when white folks - or perhaps, white Southerners - are in danger? If these were African-Americans, how would Obama be reacting? How would the media be reacting?

Welcome to post-partisanship in the Age of Obama...vote Liberal or Die...

Via JammieWearingFool and Gateway Pundit...