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Why Republicans Still Matter

Posted by Michael Goodell on Thursday, June 25, 2009 1:22:33 PM
 
“The odyssey that we’re all on in life is with regard to heart.” With these words South Carolina Governor Mark Sanford bid farewell to his Presidential aspirations, possibly to his marriage, and certainly to his political career. It was a strangely poetic confession by a hiker gone astray. “About a year ago it (his relationship with the woman known as Maria) sparked into something more than that,” he said. “And so oddly enough, I spent the last five days of my life crying in Argentina.”
 
A love so powerful as to induce a man to throw his life away is the stuff of great literature. Not being privy to his innermost thoughts, though, we don’t know if it was in fact such passion, or if, perhaps, it was a willfully self-destructive act of a man who knew he was not worthy of the highest office, who was not equal to the burdens of leadership.
 
Regardless, the fact remains, his political life is over. It is over because he failed as a husband, as a father, and as a governor. It is over mainly because he is a Republican. In America, Republicans are held to a much higher standard than Democrats. No doubt it is because Republicans claim to stand for values, responsibility and rectitude.
 
Democrats seem to face a much lower bar in the public’s eye. If you are a Democrat, your political career can survive the revelation that your latest boyfriend was running a male prostitution ring out of your townhouse. More than survive, you can rise to Chair the House Financial Services Committee. If you are a Democrat, your political career can survive, and this is putting the best interpretation on the act, abandoning a young woman to drown in a car you drove into a river. More than survive, you can rise to the status of senior statesman of your party. You can be the voice of morality for your party.
 
A Republican cannot survive such disgraces. This is not to say it isn’t fair, it is only to say that if you claim the moral high road, you had better stick to the pavement. Mark Sanford deserves the ignominy his actions will bring. He deserves the disgrace. He deserves to lose his political life. He deserves everything he will get, except, possibly, becoming the butt of a thousand jokes by hypocritic leftists.
 
There are many who maintain that, having been roundly defeated in the past two election cycles, the Republican Party has become irrelevant. This is not so. The principles which activate the Republican Party remain relevant, and will become increasingly more relevant as the Passion Play which is our government today continues to unfold. Republican office holders weren’t hurled out of office because of their principles. They were rejected precisely because they abandoned their principles. Their prime motive in Washington was the preservation of their power. They sold their honor for reelection. They spent money with disregard for economic principles and turned their back on the concept of fiscal propriety.
 
Republicans lost overwhelmingly not because they were Republicans, but because they were acting like Democrats. Now, the wisdom of replacing people acting like Democrats with Democrats, who are much more skilled at that behavior, was and will remain open to question. However, the people have spoken. They have sowed the wind, now they must reap the whirlwind.
 
The crucial lesson to be learned is not that the Republicans need to change. They need only return to the moral, fiscal and behavioral conservative standards by which their party has been historically defined. Republicans need to get back to embracing their principles, not embracing their mistresses.
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Diplomacy in the Age of Nuance

Posted by Michael Goodell on Monday, June 22, 2009 5:45:02 PM
 
The streets of Tehran are filled with chants and shouts, tear gas, bullets and blood. Citizens and leaders throughout the civilized world raise their voices in support of those beleaguered Iranians demanding their liberty. In only one spot is there silence. That is the Oval Office. Only one man remains unmoved by the wreckage of a people’s hopes for justice, and dreams of change. That man is Barack Obama.
 
One has to wonder why he remains so reticent. Why can’t our President muster sympathy for those who seemingly seek to replicate his theme of hope and change? Why can’t he tell them he supports them? Is it because they seem to be appropriating his brand, that they have, without his permission, adopted his audacity, his hope, his change?
 
Wise men and women, realists all, explain Obama’s silence by citing his reluctance to jeopardize the chance to negotiate directly with the Iranian government. If only he can get his foot in the door, they reason, he can sway the Ayatollah with his eloquence, his kindness, his wisdom, his nuance. But if he supports the concept of freedom, they will never sit down with him.
 
One hates to be the bearer of bad news, but they will never sit down with him. Obama may be the anti-Bush, but he remains the Great Satan, and only by submitting his nation to Sharia will he earn the Supreme Leader’s affection. It is unlikely he will do that, especially since he passed up a golden opportunity to do so when he addressed “The Muslim World” from a podium in Cairo. While he denied any Christian underpinnings to his own nation, and boasted that America is “one of the largest Muslim countries in the world,” while he morally equated the Holocaust with Israeli checkpoints in the West Bank, while he endorsed a woman’s right to wear the hijab while declining to support her right to bare her head, while he spoke of his Muslim roots with a forthrightness which got McCain supporters fired before the election, he did not, in the end, surrender American sovereignty.
 
The metronomic cadence of what passes for his oratory failed to put the defenders of the Islamic Revolution to sleep, as it has so many of his subjects. Instead, they were merely bored. They yawned, then turned around and stole an election. How do we know they stole the election? Perhaps the most telling sign was Khamnei’s warning to Mousavi’s supporters, the day before the people went to the polls, not to take to the streets to protest the results. They knew what they were going to do, they told the world they were going to do it, and then they did it.
 
Yet our President doesn’t want to rock the boat. He really would like the world to remain quiescent while he executes his plan to transform America into a European-style social democracy. Nasty little foreign conflicts tend to distract one’s attention when one is the leader of the most powerful country in the world. No amount of apologies on foreign soil, no amount of acts of obeisance to foreign despots, no amount of playing the ostrich can change the fact that the world is a messy place, and the United States has interests all over it. To paraphrase Donald Rumsfeld, you don’t go to the White House with the world you want, you go to the White House with the world you have.
 
Still, neither reluctance nor timidity can explain Obama’s silence. The theocratic dictatorship in Iran has never shown any signs of a desire to improve relations. The opposite inclination prevails. The Supreme Leader of the Islamic Revolution in Iran has American blood on his hands. He has the blood of Christians, Jews, and even Muslims, he has the blood of his own people on his hands. He is the one who leads the people in chants of “Death to America.”
 
Yet recently the Iranian people have taken to their roofs to chant a different slogan. Now they cry “Death to the Dictator,” and “Death to Khamanei.” This is an act tantamount to the forfeiture of their very lives. Yet they continue to do so. Why on earth would an American President decline the opportunity to show even a hint of support to those who are rising in rebellion against the sworn enemy of the American people? What could possibly motivate him? Why does he desire a meeting with the Supreme Leader so greatly that he will do nothing to jeopardize it? Why would he not support those who wish to overthrow Khamanei, and the theocratic dictatorship over which he presides?
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How Did it Come to This?

Posted by Michael Goodell on Tuesday, June 02, 2009 2:50:03 PM
 
Michael Moore has done a good thing with the Traverse City Film Festival. An annual selection of worthwhile films new and old, it has boosted the local economy and allowed the region to show off its natural beauty, great restaurants and quality resorts to a new group of visitors. Perhaps the best thing about the Film Festival is the lack of Michael Moore documentaries.
 
Moore’s first big impact on the cinematic world came with “Roger and Me,” a humorous depiction of his struggle to make then General Motors CEO Roger Smith pay attention to him. It was with this film that Moore developed his technique of presenting misinformation and downright lies as truth, as well as his cruelly mocking unwitting participants. His treatment of Flint, his ostensibly beloved hometown, was vicious to say the least. He made the city a laughingstock solely to dramatize his assertion that GM is a bad company.
 
So it was with little surprise that I read his gleeful reaction to GM’s bankruptcy announcement yesterday on the Huffing-andPuffington Post. Emblematic of Moore’s pernicious mendacity was the manner in which he couched his contempt in terms of compassion. GM is dead, he crowed, and the nation is the better for it. He begged the company’s new boss to stop building cars, to retool its factories to build high speed trains and energy-efficient buses. The old way of American transport is dead, he declared. Government Motors can return to profitability by turning one hundred percent green.
 
Of course, there is the little matter of how economically viable Moore’s new GM would be. Having spent $50 billion to buy 70% of a company with a net worth of negative $90 billion, Moore thinks it would be a good deal for the American taxpayer for the company to produce products which only the government would buy. Yes, that’s right, the same government which overspent by $140 billion, would be the only customer of Moore’s dream company.
 
Fortunately, even Barack Obama’s financial advisors are more economically sophisticated than America’s most slovenly film maker. Still, the point isn’t Moore’s fiscal ineptitude, but the delight with which he has greeted GM’s demise. Perhaps in part responsible for America’s contempt for what was once its greatest corporation, to a greater extent the Bard of Flint is a reflection of that national attitude.
 
There are many reasons for GM’s collapse, including its reluctance to confront an avaricious union during good times, and its blithe compliance with the UAW’s demands that it become the world’s largest privately owned socialist state. Beyond that, two decades of shabby design and construction, and a refusal to listen to its customers born of the arrogant assumption that the status quo would never change, contributed to a growing popular disdain, which continued unabated even after the company started delivering a better product.
 
Somewhere along the line, that disdain became ingrained and chronic. Even while the company remained the largest car manufacturer in the world, an ever larger proportion of the American public was leaving it behind.
 
Two months ago, I struck up a conversation with the man behind me in the line boarding a flight to Tucson. I mentioned that I had the worst seat on the plane (window seat in the last row of an MD-80, right next to the engine). He glanced at his ticket and announced he had the second worst seat, right next to me. Little did he know then that on any airplane the worst seat on the plane is right next to me, though he did come to understand it as I spent the next two-and-a-half hours explaining the world to him.
 
My seat mate was a 30-year veteran of the US Air Force who had built a nice life for himself upon retirement. He was on the road a lot in his new career, and mentioned how much he enjoyed driving his GMC Yukon. “It’s big enough for me, the seats are comfortable, and the ride is great. I can drive 400 miles and feel great when I get out of it.” Then he shook his head, and said, ruefully, abashedly, “I know I’m not supposed to buy an American car, but I like it,” in the same tone he might have used if he had said, “I know I’m not supposed to drive drunk.”
 
I was awestruck by his comment. How did we get to the point where buying an American car was viewed as iniquity? After all, this wasn’t an anticapitalist Monkey Wrench crusader, this was a veteran, a patriot, a proud American. Yet he was ashamed to buy a vehicle which he enjoyed, and which gave him good value for money, simply because it was made by an American car maker.
 
There seems to be some vital disconnect between the public’s view of American industry and its reality. Isn’t it arguable that the facile deceptions promulgated by the likes of Michael Moore have contributed to this situation? Will Obama’s stewardship of General Motors help them turn the corner? Will forcing them to build uncomfortable, unsafe cars which no one really wants to drive inspire people to buy them solely because they are made by a new American car company?
 
The answer, no doubt, will be found in a forthcoming Michael Moore documentary.
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I Seen You

Posted by Michael Goodell on Friday, May 29, 2009 3:20:21 PM
 
No doubt you’ve heard the United States Postal Service motto, which goes “Neither rain nor snow nor cyclists’ rights will stay these couriers from the swift completion of their appointed rounds.” Now some nitpickers  might argue that the actual motto says “gloom of night,” not “cyclists’ rights,” and they may be technically correct. However, after having a postal carrier’s truck pull out from a side street directly at me while I was riding my bike today, I’m inclined to believe they’ve changed it.
 
When confronted with certain injury, if not death, the prudent cyclist will shout at the top of his lungs while waving his arms vociferously in a bid to attract the wayward motorist’s attention. This was my strategy when staring at the grill of the rapidly approaching truck. Apparently in the USPS lexicon of etiquette, protesting an imminent collision is considered gauche, as the driver was highly indignant in response.
 
“I seen you,” he shouted at me as he drove past, to which I responded, “I didn’t know that.” I followed him to the next street to try to explain why he shouldn’t start moving while a cyclist is directly in front of him. “I seen you!” he yelled before I could get a word out. “But I have no way of knowing that you saw me,” I said. “I seen you!” he cried.  This incident, while slightly more dramatic than most, is repeated countless times every day on the streets of America. Vehicles pull up to stop signs, and while gazing somewhere down the street, will begin to pull forward as a cyclist enters the intersection. It’s hard to believe that the drivers don’t understand the terror a cyclist feels in that situation, but apparently they don’t.
 
Well, here’s a little equation that might help explain things: Car or SUV= more than 2,000 pounds. Cyclist and bicycle=usually less than 200 pounds (or more in the case of certain essayists). If you do the math it becomes obvious that cyclists rarely win this confrontation. Since many communities are apparently resistant to the idea of developing bike routes and dedicated bike lanes, cyclists and motorists must share the road. This means motorists have to treat cyclists with the same consideration they would other motorists. Not only does it help preserve cyclists’ safety and sanity, it is the law. Rarely do motorists start to drive into the path of oncoming vehicles, out of impatience, or disregard. Yet they do it routinely when confronted with a passing bicycle.
 
Recently I rolled to a stop as I approached a busy street. There was a woman in a black SUV sitting at the stop sign across the street, and a child riding along the sidewalk. As he approached the intersection, she accelerated across the street. It was fortunate that the child didn’t know his rights as a cyclist. Otherwise he would have crossed without stopping, and ridden  directly into the path of the SUV. The driver, chatting merrily on her cell phone, went blithely on her way, completely ignorant of the fact that she had nearly run over a child. Here’s another handy equation: suburban woman + SUV + cell phone = run for your lives.
 
This kind of near disaster happens all too frequently where I live, especially during late spring and early summer, when cyclists take to the streets in greater numbers, and motorists are slow to shake their wintertime complacency when very few people ride. The fact that our houses and gardens look so beautiful at this time of year only adds to the potential for accidents, as both motorists and cyclists tend to be distracted by the sight of flowering trees and shrubs. It is important for all parties to practice extra diligence at this time of year.
 
Motorists need to understand that cyclists have the same right to use the road as they do, and to ignore that fact is tantamount to assault with a deadly weapon. For their part, cyclists need to recognize that motorists are possibly not yet used to seeing them. They should give cars, SUV’s and trucks the respect they deserve, and not intentionally obstruct their passage.
 
The League of Michigan Bicyclists offers a bumper sticker which reads “Same Road, Same Rights, Same Rules,” which sums up the obligations on both sides of the equation. Yes, cyclists have the same right to the road as motorists, and many are quick to assert those rights. But how many cyclists observe the same rules? How many stop at stop signs and red lights, even when no cars are coming? How many wait until the light turns green before proceeding through an intersection?
 
The fact is, cyclists are obligated to obey all traffic laws, and their failure to do so is not only dangerous, but it helps contribute to motorists’ view that they are irresponsible. It is hard enough to gain motorists’ respect without actively offending them. Yet at the end of the day, drivers and riders have to share the same space. We would all be better off if we used common sense and exercised mutual respect.
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STOP IT! STOP IT NOW!

Posted by Michael Goodell on Tuesday, May 26, 2009 11:47:25 AM
 
In an impressive demonstration of its willingness to engage with President Barack Obama’s more civil, sophisticated and internationalist approach to foreign policy, North Korea detonated a 10- to 20-kiloton nuclear bomb over Memorial Day weekend. This time it appears chief thug and blood-thirsty murderer Kim Jong Il may have gone too far.
 
Accustomed to a history of appeasement, no doubt the Dear Leader was taken aback by the unanimous cries of outrage and condemnation which greeted the blast. Obama, eschewing the cowboy diplomacy of his predecessor, who repeatedly called for a coordinated international response to North Korea’s provocations, called for a coordinated international response to North Korea’s provocations. “North Korea’s nuclear and ballistic-missile programs pose a great threat to the peace and security of the world, and I strongly condemn their reckless action,” the Commander in Chief elaborated.
 
Most of the rest of the world’s leaders joined in the chorus, including those of England, France, Germany and Sierra Leone. Venezuelan President Hugo Chavez, it is rumored, responded to the occasion by offering to lend another book to the American President, in this case his treasured copy of “Pride and Prejudice and Zombies.”
 
Not to be outdone, China, formerly the world’s leading force for restraint in the civilized world’s response to its client state’s serial violations, said it is “resolutely opposed to the test.” The “Wall Street Journal” noted that the Chinese statement was “nearly identical to its response in October 2006 (the date of North Korea’s first nuke test), but stronger than its response in April.”
 
World leaders took heart at this development, because it was only with China’s support that the United Nations Security Council was able to draft a strongly worded resolution banning North Korea from conducting nuclear development. The Security Council forcefully condemned the North Korean test, stating that it was a “clear violation” of the 2006 resolution, and that it would start work immediately on a new, more strongly worded resolution. Some UN insiders speculate that it might even say “STOP IT! STOP IT NOW!” Others suggest the resolution might take the form of “If I have to turn around one more time I’m going to stop this car and give you a spanking!”
 
Regardless of the particular language they choose, most observers believe North Korea has no real intention of using its nuclear arsenal, preferring to use its existence merely as a means of extorting more money from the west, or to earn much-needed foreign currency by extorting its technology to other rogue regimes, and possibly terrorist groups.
 
Even if nuclear weapons find their way into the hands of terrorists, or, in the parlance of Homeland Security Secretary Janet Neapolitano, “man-caused disaster causers,” this should pose no real threat to the United States. Even if man-caused disaster causers do manage to detonate a device in, say, New York or Washington, D.C., Obama administration officials are confident that the Justice Department will manage to shift the ensuing criminal trial to some other as yet unincinerated city.
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Beyond Clueless

Posted by Michael Goodell on Tuesday, May 05, 2009 3:02:51 PM
 

Those of you not fortunate enough to live in Paradise may be unaware that the State of Michigan has been mired in a recession for the past decade. Ten years of steady deleveraging from its industrial base has resulted in a shrinking economy, dwindling population, and steady erosion of property values and tax base. In fact, over this time, only two Michigan entities have grown, the unemployment rate, and government.

Until the national economy tanked last fall, Michigan was able to use the rest of the country as a safety valve. Unable to find work at home, Michiganders could, and did, go elsewhere in search of jobs. Ironically, the national recession struck Michigan harder than most. One would have thought that, having been shrinking and suffering for years, the state would have been insulated from the steep decline other states were facing.

Sadly, that wasn’t the case. Many companies, especially auto manufacturers and their suppliers, which were barely hanging on despite a growing economy, were pushed to the brink, or even over the edge, by the downturn. Now, even government has confronted the reality that it must contract. This in turn has generated an even greater crisis, for as everyone knows, the primary function of government is constant expansion.

Today the reality of the state’s economic woes have finally hit home. Even Michigan Governor Jennifer Granholm, known in some circles as the Alicia Silverstone of Elected Officials, has come to understand the futility of increasing taxes when everyone in the state is out of work. She is expected to slash $300 million from the current state budget. Cuts in Medicaid payments to doctors and hospitals, a reduction of up to $40 million in revenue sharing for cities and townships, and layoffs and furloughs of state employees are among the draconian moves she will make.

Naturally, this will cause hardship for just about every public employee and administrator. Among those expressing concern is Alan Kilar, representative of UAW Local 6000, which represents 17,000 state employees. The UAW used to stand for United Auto Workers, but over the years the union has functioned in a manner similar to The Other White Meat Flu. First infecting the auto industry, the UAW has since spread to other industries, and even government, until a vast array of entities lie sick, dying, and even dead. No longer confined to auto workers, the acronym UAW today should stand for Unions Achieve Wreckage.

Kilar, viewing the economic wasteland which is the state and its government, made the following suggestion. "We’re hoping the government looks to the auto industry, where they cut upper management and asked suppliers to take a cut."

Only a UAW official could have the audacity to offer the domestic auto industry as a model for fiscal prudence. Yes, this is the same industry, once known as The Big Three, in which one component has already declared bankruptcy, and a second one is well on its way to doing so. This is an industry which has sealed its own doom by perpetually bending over backwards to comply with the UAW’s every whim, which has allowed itself to succumb to an unworkable business model designed and implemented by the very union advocating the industry as an object of emulation.

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Gibbs Explains it All

Posted by Michael Goodell on Friday, May 01, 2009 2:21:11 PM
 
Back in the early nineties there was a groundbreaking show on Nickelodeon called “Clarissa Explains it All,” in which Melissa Joan Hart played a spunky, perky, wise-beyond-her-years teenaged girl who set things straight for her viewing audience . These days the White House is airing a sequel, called “Gibbs Explains it All,” in which Robert Gibbs plays a spunky, perky, wise-beyond-his years White House Press Secretary who sets things straight for his viewing audience.
 
Among the more popular episodes in this exciting new series was “The King and Eye Level,” in which Gibbs explained that President Obama hadn’t actually bowed down to the King of Saudi Arabia, saying, “No, I think he bent over with both, to shake–with both hands to shake his, so I don’t–“
 
Coming on the heels of daily explanations of why yet another cabinet nominee selected during the smoothest transition in the history of the world had to resign, Gibb’s performances soon became one of the hottest tickets in town.
 
One of the problems with running a successful improv act is the need to constantly come up with new material. Many observers, while acknowledging Gibb’s early success, expressed doubts about whether he could sustain momentum. Those concerns have been allayed, most recently by Vice President Joe Biden’s calming words about The Other White Meat Flu Epidemic.
 
In remarks aired on NBC’s “Today Show,” Biden said, “I would tell members of my family, and I have, I wouldn’t go anywhere in confined places now. It’s not that it’s going to Mexico. It’s that you’re in a confined aircraft. When one person sneezes, it goes all the way through the aircraft. That’s me. I would not be, at this point, if they had another way of transportation, be suggesting they ride the subway.”
 
While this might seem like the kind of advice any concerned parent might give to his children, especially if they couldn’t find alternative means of transportation, such as, say, Henny Penny, Goosey Loosey or Turkey Lurkey, the fact that the Number Two elected official was telling people not to leave their homes struck terror in the hearts of travel and transportation professionals. It also departed dramatically from the official White House line of “Be concerned, but don’t be alarmed. Now go wash your hands.”
 
Something had to be done, and done quickly. Suddenly, Robert Gibbs came to the rescue with the latest installment of “Gibbs Explains it All.” When ABC’s Jake Tapper asked Gibbs if he could explain Biden’s “fear-mongering,” Gibbs replied, “I think the–what the Vice President meant to say was–uh, the same thing that, uh, again, many members have said in the last few days and nights, if you feel sick, uh, if you are exhibiting symptoms, flulike symptoms, coughing, sneezing, uh, runny nose, uh, then you should take precautions, that you should, uh, limit your travel.”
 
When Tapper responded, “With all due respect, that doesn’t sound remotely like what he said,” Gibbs brought the house down by saying, “I understand what he said, and I’m telling you what he meant to say.”
 
Gibbs could probably do the world a service by helping us understand what other historic figures meant to say when they said what they said.
 
When Nathan Hale said “I regret that I have but one life to give to my country,” Gibbs could explain that he meant to say, “Uh, hello? Wasn’t someone going to rescue me?”
 
When Winston Churchill said “We shall fight them on the beaches, we shall fight them on the landing grounds, we shall fight them in the fields and in the streets, we shall fight them in the hills; we shall never surrender,” what he meant was, “Maybe if the Japanese bomb Pearl Harbor I can get Roosevelt off his duff and the Yanks will bail us out again.”
 
When John F. Kennedy said, “Ask not what your country can do for you, ask what you can do for your country,” what he meant was “Say, is that Judith Exner in the third row?”
 
When Richard Nixon said, “I am not a crook,” what he meant was “But I am a sneak and a liar.”
 
When Bill Clinton said, “I did not have sex with that woman, Miss Lewinski,” what he meant was “Eh heh, heh, heh.”
 
When Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said “We will wipe Israel off the face of the map,” what he meant was “Can’t we just sit down and talk?”
 
When Hugo Chavez said, “The devil came here yesterday. It still smells of sulphur today,” what he meant was, “Can’t we just sit down and talk?”
 
And when Nancy Pelosi said, “Every month that we do not have an economic recovery package, 500 million Americans lose their jobs. I don’t think we can go fast enough,” what she meant was, well, not even “Gibbs Explains it All” could help with that one.
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I Opened a Window . . .

Posted by Michael Goodell on Wednesday, April 29, 2009 3:58:46 PM
 
The following is an actual transcript of a fictional cable news program which is, to be honest, probably not any worse than anything currently on the air.
 
HARDCASE: Good evening. I’m Chris Hardcase, and you’re watching Curveball. Tonight we’re devoting the entire hour to the Swine Flu pandemic. This is the greatest crisis to hit the world since President Obama’s (Hardcase’s right leg begins jittering uncontrollably) election. Even as we speak, hospital emergency rooms across our nation are being swamped with reporters and camera crews filing live reports. The Center for Disease Control is working twenty-four hours a day now, trying to get a grip on this crisis. According to reports, up to 20% of their research staff has been pulled out of their laboratories to handle media inquiries. On the show tonight we have Tom Vlasic of the United States Department of Agriculture, Jane Neapolitan from the Department of Homeland Security, and Trancazo Enfermedad from the Mexican Embassy here in Washington to discuss the pandemic. How bad is it? Whose fault is it? Are we all going to die? But first, a special report from Kim Collagen. Kim?
 
COLLAGEN: Chris, I’m standing in front of the Center for Disease Control headquarters where  Dr. Upton Chuck has just released new information on the scope of this crisis. According to the latest figures, more than fifty people in six states have already fallen victim to this silent, lethal killer.
 
HARDCASE: Fifty? Are you sure? (Hardcase’s face is ashen). This is worse than we thought.
 
COLLAGEN: (Solemnly). It gets worse, Chris.
 
HARDCASE: Worse? How is that possible? Oh, Obama (his right leg jitters uncontrollably) save us.
 
COLLAGEN: Chris, I’m sorry to say, but we may never know how severely this epidemic has hit us. According to Dr. Chuck, efforts to get an accurate count have been handicapped by the fact that many people have already recovered from this lethal disease, and in other cases, people assume that they are “just suffering from the flu.” They might have Swine Flu and not even realize it. The CDC is urging anyone who feels the least bit nauseous, or who thinks they might have a head cold or sore throat, to go to the nearest emergency room at once. The authorities need to get as accurate account as possible. I’m Kim Collagen, reporting from Atlanta.
 
HARDCASE: Thanks, Kim, for that terrifying report. Now, let’s turn to our panel. Swine Flu. How bad is it? Can we blame this on Bush, and are we all going to die? Let’s start with Tom Vlasic. Tom, how bad is it? Can we blame this on Bush, and are we all going to die?
 
VLASIC: Those are tough questions, Chris. First, let me say that we aren’t all going to die. Probably not even half of us.
 
NEAPOLITAN: Half of us?
 
VLASIC: That’s what I’m hearing.
 
NEAPOLITAN: (Sighing with relief). Whew, then it’s not as bad as we expected.
 
VLASIC: True, but that doesn’t mean we aren’t in a crisis. In fact, one of the worst aspects of it, and one which has received very little play, is the impact this epidemic is having on the pig population, or our porcine citizens, as we at the USDA like to call them.
 
HARDCASE: What kind of impact, Tom? Can pigs get swine flu, too?
 
VLASIC: Well, it’s not so much that they can get sick, though they can, but the name itself. The Secretary feels that calling this a Swine Flu epidemic will have the effect of stigmatizing our porcine citizens. I don’t think that’s the kind of thing we as Americans should be doing.
 
HARDCASE: (Frowning). That’s a good point, Tom. I hadn’t thought of that. So, what should we do? I mean, we have to call it something.
 
VLASIC: Well, we’ve been kicking a few ideas around over at the USDA, and right now we’re leaning toward calling it The Other White Meat Flu.
 
HARDCASE: Okay, got it. The Other White Meat Flu it is. Yes, Mr. Enfermedad–do you mind if I call you Trancazo?
 
ENFERMEDAD: Si, uh, sure. Whatever you want. But I’m sitting here listening to all of you go on about this--I’m sorry, I’m sticking with Swine Flu-- epidemic, and one thing I’m not hearing is any kind of apology for the slander against my country.
 
HARDCASE: Your country. That would be Mexico?
 
NEAPOLITAN: Mexico? That sounds familiar. Where is Mexico again? I’m drawing a blank.
 
HARDCASE: What is it you do at Homeland Security, Jane?
 
NEAPOLITAN: I’m Director of Border Control, and believe me, if it were possible to stop this epidemic, you can be sure we at Homeland Security would have already done it. It’s not like it was under the last administration, when they couldn’t even stop a hurricane. We take our job very seriously.
 
HARDCASE: Well, that’s good to know. And it’s true, since Barack Obama (Hardcase’s leg begins jittering again, causing him to pound on it repeatedly) was elected, correct me if I’m wrong, but not a single hurricane has struck this nation.
 
NEAPOLITAN: Well, hurricanes are one thing, but lethal epidemics which sweep across the country so fast that people recover before they even knew they were dying, that’s something else. We’ve been looking at all sorts of solutions. Some of them are quite draconian. In fact, we’ve even had to pull people away from their surveillance jobs–
 
HARDCASE: (Horrified). You mean–
 
NEAPOLITAN: (Grimly). Yes, there are hundreds of VFW halls in this country that aren’t being monitored. But this is a crisis, and we only have so many resources. We can only hope these disgruntled vets don’t choose this moment to strike–
 
HARDCASE: Well, that’s getting awfully close to a future episode, so let’s just stick to the crisis at hand. What are some of the steps Homeland Security is prepared to take?
 
NEAPOLITAN: Well, we have considered closing our borders, for one thing.
 
ENFERMEDAD: No! You cannot do this thing! It would be a disaster!
 
NEAPOLITAN: (Laughing). I’m sorry Mr. Enfermedad. I should have been more clear. We were only thinking about closing the official crossing points.
 
ENFERMEDAD: (Fanning himself with a handkerchief). Oh, gracias. Thank you. El Caudillo will be very happy to hear this.
 
NEAPOLITAN: Not at all. Anything to help a neighbor. That’s right, isn’t it? You’re a neighbor.
 
ENFERMEDAD: Right next door, for the time being.
 
NEAPOLITAN: (Making a note). Good, I’ll have to remember that. Anyway, it looks like we aren’t going to close any borders after all. According to my boss, The Other White Meat Flu is moving too quickly for it to do any good. One thing we are doing though, is effective immediately, we’re requiring airline passengers to start removing their socks, as well as their shoes.
 
VLASIC: I don’t get it. What good will that do?
 
NEAPOLITAN: Well, it won’t do any good at all, Tom. But it will look like we’re doing something, and isn’t that what it’s all about?
 
HARDCASE: Well, that’s all the time we have tonight. Join us tomorrow, that is, if you’re still alive, when we’ll have Justin Timberlake, Brad Pitt and Barney Frank to discuss “Michelle or Jackie: Who’s Hotter?”
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Words Must Mean Something

Posted by Michael Goodell on Monday, April 06, 2009 10:58:52 AM
 
After listening to the international community fulminate for weeks at the prospect, North Korea blithely launched its latest missile. Though they claimed it was an attempt to launch a satellite into orbit, from which a soundtrack of psalms to Kim Jong-Il would play on a continuous loop, most military and aeronautic experts believed it was in fact a test of the Taepodong-2 ballistic missile.
 
Since the missile will be able to strike the continental United States, and given North Korea’s propensity for marketing military technology to rogue states and terrorists alike, the launch was rightly seen as a destabilizing act. The world stood as one in its opposition to the test. Yet North Korea ignored world opinion. They openly defied the civilized world. They sowed the wind, now they reap the whirlwind.
 
It didn’t take long for the world to react. During a campaign stop in Prague, President Barack Obama declared, “Rules must be binding. Violations must be punished. Words must mean something.” Basking in the outpouring of love and admiration his strong statement engendered, Obama added that ever-popular campaign trail trophe, “Now is the time for a strong international response.”
 
Now is the time indeed. Acting quickly in response to Obama’s charge, the United Nations Security Council held an emergency session Sunday night to debate its response. The choice was stark, the consequences severe. On the one hand, the Security Council could agree to enforce the harsh sanctions enacted two-and-a-half years ago, when North Korea detonated a nuclear device. Others on the council thought that response wasn’t strong enough. The need to send a message was clear, they argued, and rather than simply enforce sanctions already approved, it would be more effective to enact still harsher sanctions, which could then be ignored.
 
The decision so weighty, the divide between the options so profound, the Security Council adjourned the session, agreeing to meet at some later date when they could agree on which option to choose.
 
Though North Koreans were reeling in the face of this devastating international response, Obama felt that more needed to be done. To this end he offered to drastically reduce America’s nuclear arms stockpile. Though his decision was reached unilaterally, the President reached out to our international partners, promising to convene an international summit so other countries could slash their armories as well. Disarming in the face of North Korea’s, and Iran’s active, defiant arming should, if nothing else, embarrass the hell out of those rogue states.
 
As if that weren’t already a huge response, and at the risk of being accused of piling on, Defense Secretary Robert Gates stands ready to join the fray. As part of his eagerly anticipated plan to reshape the U.S. military, Gates is expected to announce today a reduction in funding for missile defense programs.
 
“Words must mean something,” our President says. Actions, too, carry import, and if in the face of defiant militarism we offer to disarm and dismantle our defenses, we are sending a powerful message. It is the kind of message designed to strike fear into the hearts of rogue leaders and terrorists everywhere. But even more important than that, it is the kind of message designed to fill the hearts of European, even French, intellectuals with love.
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The Man Who Saved America

Posted by Michael Goodell on Monday, March 30, 2009 4:28:13 PM
 
September 10, 2001. The United States was mired in an economic slump. It was teetering toward recession, and it was about to get a lot worse. How much worse? The very next day, four Boeing 757's took off from Boston and New York. These planes, capable of carrying close to 250 people each, contained a total of 201 passengers and crew, combined.
 
How do we know this? Because that’s how many people died when they were flown into the World Trade Center, the Pentagon, and a field in Pennsylvania. This is one of the forgotten stories of the day which became known as 9/11.
 
When those four planes, two each operated by American and United Airlines, took off on lucrative transcontinental flights, they were barely 20% occupied. When was the last time you were on a flight in which eight out of 10 seats were empty? That is an example of how bad the American economy was on that fateful morning.
 
Needless to say, the economy grew dramatically worse in an instant when those four planes reached their unscheduled destinations. Virtually all business screeched to a halt. The stock markets were closed. Air traffic was discontinued. Shopping malls and grocery stores were vacant. Streets and highways were empty. Normal everyday commerce was abandoned.
 
This would have been a dire development in the best of times, but given the state of the economy before that day began, the situation threatened to spin tragically out of control. If something wasn’t done to encourage people to come out of hiding, the recession could have turned into a depression with far reaching consequences.
 
Enter General Motors CEO Rick Wagoner. Wagoner was stranded in Switzerland. He couldn’t get a flight home, not even on a private jet (this was back in the days when car guys could fly private jets without incurring the wrath of nattering Congressional nonentities), because US air space was closed.
 
It didn’t take a Nobel winning economist to recognize that things were in desperate straits back home, but only Wagoner had the vision to identify a solution. Only Wagoner acted to help get the American economy moving again, to induce American consumers to emerge from their shells.
 
Only Wagoner called the office to tell his company to start selling cars at 0% interest. On September 19, GM introduced the program, and people flocked to showrooms across the country. They went, they kicked tires, they test drove, many of them bought, and they all returned home safely. Gradually, the word went out. It was okay to continue to function. Life would go on.
 
The economy stabilized, at least for another eight years. By that time General Motors was teetering on the edge of collapse. Even if Wagoner had another great idea, it wouldn’t have mattered. He, and General Motors couldn’t have implemented it.
 
This morning Wagoner went to the well one last time. After several years of painful cuts and desperate acts to stave off destruction, the CEO made one last gesture to save his company. Confronted with the Obama administration’s ultimatum, “Either you resign or we let GM fail,” Wagoner fell on his sword, and resigned, in order to buy time for one last infusion of cash, one last chance to allow General Motors to survive.
 
With this last act, Wagoner has ensured that he will go into the annals of popular history as the man who drove the world’s greatest industrial company to the brink of destruction. All the errors in judgement, all the short-sighted decisions, all the criminally stupid styling decisions will be laid, unjustly, at his feet. He will fade away, into obscurity. Into disgrace.
 
Yet before the last shovel of sod is tossed on his professional grave, it should be remembered that, for one shining moment, on September 19, 2001, Rick Wagoner was the man who saved America.
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The Death of Honor

Posted by Michael Goodell on Friday, March 27, 2009 11:35:43 AM
 
It has been a long time since anyone has mistaken the United States Congress for a hotbed of integrity. Hypocrisy, venality and outright corruption have been the qualities most evident in Washington. Men and women in the House and Senate have grown accustomed to holding the truth hostage to personal aggrandizement. The interests of the people, their putative constituents, routinely take a backseat to a politician’s highest duty, which is to get reelected.
 
Yet even with the bar of integrity set in a trench, our nation’s elected officials failed to pass that test during the AIG Bonus affair. From the President to the lowliest Republican Representative, the series of events set in place by the bonuses showed everyone at his or her absolute worst.
 
First we had the Treasury Secretary lying about what he knew about the bonuses and when he knew it. Of course, given the fact that he lied to his former employer and took money for taxes he knew he hadn’t paid, and then lied on his tax forms, and then lied about it to the public before finally coming clean during his confirmation hearings, expecting veracity from him was perhaps indicative of a fatal Pollyanna naivete.
 
Barack Obama fared no better. Faced with an explosion of populist outrage, he once again subsumed the obligations of leadership to the luxury of expedience. Rather than temper the anger with cool reason, he grabbed a pitchfork to get out in front of the mob. As the fires of outrage intensified, the House of Representatives jumped into the fray.
 
Doing what they do best, they mounted another in the series of kangaroo courts which have so sickened the dwindling number of sentient Americans. Clambering atop each other’s slathering visages to cast thunderbolts of invective at hapless witnesses, they played their roles with ogrish abandon. So fervent were they in their antipanegyrics that Obama himself, not long since he was leading the mob, had to call for calm.
 
Whether borne of ignorance or cynicism, they ignored the fact that the “Stimulus Package” they had approved contained language ensuring that the bonuses would be paid, and demanded justice, Old West Style. The gallows were already half-erected when they passed their bill to levy a 91% tax on the bonuses. Since they had passed the stimulus bill without reading it, in answer to their President’s Chicken Little cries, perhaps they remained ignorant of what they had approved. After all, why bother reading something you’ve already passed? That’s why we have hordes of trial attorneys in this country.
 
Still, it defies belief that even this collection of demagogic popinjays were unaware that the bill they enacted in a spittle spewing passion violated the constitution. More damning yet, they likely passed it knowing full well it was illegal. They passed it to send a message to the seething masses that “We are on your side.” Rather than lead, they followed.
 
Consider the sad case of Pete Hoekstra, a Republican Representative from Michigan. Formerly a man of integrity, he voted in favor of the act because “a vote against taxing the AIG bonuses would have been used against him in future political races.” Furthermore, he knew it wouldn’t ever become law, because it was unconstitutional. Thus we have it from Mr. Hoekstra, given a choice between upholding the US Constitution and positioning himself for reelection, he opted to assault the very foundation of this nation, for personal gain.
 
Hoekstra shouldn’t wait to be voted out of office in 2010. He should resign today. He has failed in the most basic duty of a Congressman. Of course, he isn’t alone. There are 327 other Representatives who share his iniquity. If they had any integrity, they would all resign.
 
Of course, if they had any integrity, they wouldn’t be members of Congress.
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A City Full of Idiots

Posted by Michael Goodell on Tuesday, March 10, 2009 11:01:18 AM
Of all the shabby revelations in the latest batch of Mayoral text messages, the most disturbing is this: “How do you educate voters in a city full of idiots?”
 
For too long Detroit residents have allowed themselves to be manipulated by racist demagoguery, Afrocentrist rhetoric, and ludicrous references to the city’s “jewels.” They need to understand that white suburbanites are not casting greedy glances at the city and its charms. In the eyes of the suburbs, Detroit no longer has any jewels. While there are many suburbanites who want the city to survive, to improve, to return to the ranks of vibrant urban centers, they know they are helpless.
 
It is time for Detroiters to realize this. Furthermore, it is time for Detroiters to realize that their problems start with them, and with their elected leaders who cynically manipulate their fears and frustrations, who employ misdirection to fan resentment at distant suburbs while continuing to feast on the festering corpse of the city.
 
That their leaders think Detroiters are idiots should come as no surprise, because they keep electing them. They reelected a Mayor who treated his first term as a party limousine. They elected a Council President who threatens to shoot people with whom she disagrees. They elected a School Board Member who is unfit to retain custody of his own children. They continue to pay fealty to leaders whose decisions have made their city into a national joke. No wonder they think Detroiters are idiots.
 
Detroiters need to wake up. They need to realize their salvation must begin with themselves. They need to understand that no amount of outside money will help them if it all flows into the pockets of their elected leaders. No amount of stimulus funding will help Detroit students until Detroiters make education their highest priority. It doesn’t matter how many more cops take to the streets if Detroiters continue to reject  the ideal of a civil society. Real change, true reform, must begin with Detroiters. If they don’t demand it, of their leaders, their institutions, and themselves, then they truly are idiots.
 
Now, many Detroiters will respond to this with outrage. “How dare you, a suburbanite, lecture us about our city?” they will cry. The answer is, of course, that except for those shortsighted few who view Detroit as some kind of sick sitcom, who retail tales of Mayoral malfeasance and Council cupidity for the amusement of out of towners, most Metro Detroiters realize that their towns, their homes, their communities all suffer from Detroit’s failures.
 
Suburbanites don’t want “steal Detroit’s jewels,” they want Detroit’s jewels to shine again. They want them to be burnished, to glitter with the light of prosperity. They want to be proud of them, and to proudly declare wherever they go, “I’m from Detroit.”
 
But they can’t do it alone. They can’t begin to take pride in their city until Detroiters take pride in themselves. They need Detroiters to tell their leaders they aren’t idiots, and to stop electing them if they refuse to hear their voices.
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Do it For the Children

Posted by Michael Goodell on Tuesday, March 03, 2009 12:56:46 PM
When I stopped by my local tobacconist yesterday to pick up another carton, Sonny warned me that beginning April 1, cigarettes will go up 61 cents a pack. “It’s that new tax,” he explained. “For children’s health care.”
 
This got me to thinking. If they raise tobacco taxes too much, people will quit. How will they fund the program then? Possibly, something like this:
 
Dateline: March 3, 2011
 
President Barack Obama stunned reporters today when he lit a cigarette during a press conference. It was his first press conference in six months, ending speculation that he had been ousted by a junta consisting of former President Bill Clinton, his wife, former Secretary of State Hillary Clinton and Vice-President Joe Biden.
 
Obama dismissed his absence from the public by saying he had been “busy with the kids, you know, Parent-Teacher conferences, things like that.”
 
The President lit up when answering a question from Rush Limbaugh about growing deficits in the National Health Service. The following is a transcript of that exchange:
 
OBAMA:  Mmmm, now this tastes good, like a cigarette should. The problem started when we funded the S-Chip expansion with a dramatic increase in tobacco taxes. This worked for awhile until ACORN filed that lawsuit.
 
LIMBAUGH (follow-up): Whoa, ACORN sued you? Why didn’t we hear about this?
 
OBAMA: Because once we pushed through the Fairness Doctrine, and you lost your job, there was nobody left to report it. By the way, how do you like your new gig in the White House Press Corps?
 
LIMBAUGH: It’s alright, I get on TV now and then, and the food’s pretty good in the White House Mess. But what about that ACORN suit?
 
OBAMA: Oh, right. I was hoping you’d overlook that. ACORN sued, claiming that the cigarette tax was discriminatory against poor people and minorities, because they smoke more heavily than wealthy, educated white people do. The Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals found in their favor, and directed us to use funds from S-CHIP to help poor people pay for their habits.
 
LIMBAUGH: Wouldn’t it have made more sense to just rescind the tax?
 
OBAMA: We considered that, but we needed the money to help wean middle class children off their reliance on private medical insurance. So we raised the tax another 50 cents.
 
LIMBAUGH: How’d that work out for you?
 
OBAMA: (Crushing out cigarette, and lighting another one). Not so well. You see, being mired in a depression the way we were, poor people were the only ones who could afford to smoke. Everyone else quit. So we had no revenues coming in, and we were paying out so much in smoking subsidies that pretty soon children were once again going without health insurance.
 
LIMBAUGH: So now you’re–
 
OBAMA: One of the great things about being President is being able to use the “bully pulpit.” Incidentally, do you know where that phrase came from? I didn’t until just the other day when Joe Biden explained it to me. It started with Teddy Roosevelt. It seems that once he came back from the Spanish-American war he was suffering from Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and he started preaching sermons in local churches. If he ever caught anyone sleeping or otherwise not paying attention, he would yell at them. He would bully them until they woke up.
 
LIMBAUGH: Er, are you sure about that?
 
OBAMA: Hey, if Joe says it, it must be true. I mean, you don’t mess with Joe.
 
LIMBAUGH: Okay, but what’s with the smoking?
 
OBAMA: I’m trying to set a good example. We need Americans to start smoking again. We need the tobacco tax dollars to help fund necessary health care reform. So I’m asking all Americans. Please start smoking. Do it for the children.


 

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Oh Baby, Baby

Posted by Michael Goodell on Tuesday, February 24, 2009 4:06:35 PM
Back before he booked passage on an express train back to the Fourteenth Century, Cat Stevens wrote a song called “Wild World,” which contained the lyrics, “Oh baby, baby it’s a wild world, it’s hard to get by just upon a smile.”
 
These words keep rattling around in my head while I read the daily news. Our nation is mired in a severe economic downturn. It may be the worst recession since 1981. It may be the worst recession since 1973. Surprisingly, there are many, and many in Washington today, who ardently hope these are the worst times since the Great Depression.
 
It is curious to say the least to think that some people who ostensibly have the American people’s interests at heart should pine for the days when nearly one in four Americans couldn’t find a job, when men would abandon their families to wander the roads in search of a few grains of sustenance. But then again, as White House Chief of Staff Rahm Emanuel is fond of saying, “Never let a crisis go to waste.”
 
Fresh from their success with the “Stimulus Package,” the 1,100 page paradigm shift which passed unread, there are those who seek to reshape the way we live and breathe as Americans. By shifting the center leftwards, they seek to institutionalize the greatest growth in the reach and role of government in American history.
 
Regardless of the merits of such a campaign, the single-minded focus on domestic concerns ignores the certain reality that we are living in a dangerous world. While we spend time debating bailouts and tax increases, those who were plotting to kill Americans when George W. Bush was President continue to plot to kill Americans today. Those who sought to undercut American authority, influence and power under Bush continue to do so today. In fact, they are doing so at an ever-increasing rate.
 
Barack Obama’s offer to extend an open hand of peace seems to have been met with the mailed fist of hostility. Russia is busy calving off the components of its former empire, militarizing Ossetia and Abkhazia, intimidating Ukraine, buying off Kyrgystan, and shaking the faith of former Warsaw Pact nations in the reliability of their western allies. Iran is moving ahead with nuclear weapons development and thumbing their nose at American overtures. North Korea is test launching missiles capable of striking the United States. Pakistan is surrendering to the Taliban. As for China, they are being very, very quiet, which is the most frightening development of all.
 
President Obama is new to the job, and he has a lot on his plate right now. We can only hope that someone is keeping his or her eye on the big picture, and reminding him that, “Oh baby ,baby, it’s a wild world. It’s hard to get by just upon a smile.”

www.zenithrising.webs.com
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Catastrophe!

Posted by Michael Goodell on Friday, February 06, 2009 2:27:59 PM
While he has encouraged them in only the most oblique of gestures, using the Lincoln Bible for the Presidential Oath, paying Dick Cheney to sit in a wheelchair, and having two adorable children and a glamourous wife, Barack Obama basks in the commentariat’s adulatory comparisons to Abraham Lincoln, Franklin Roosevelt and John F. Kennedy.
 
However, after just two weeks in the White House, mired in the chaos  accruing from the smoothest transition in the history of the world, Obama’s performance thus far bears comparison to a much less successful President. No, not Jimmy Carter, though that’s not a bad guess. I was thinking more of Chicken Little. Now, some might argue that Chicken Little was never elected President. That’s a good point, but it doesn’t change the simple fact that THE SKY IS FALLING! THE SKY IS FALLING!
 
That, at any rate, seems to be the message Obama is trying to hammer home. Because some mean spirited Republican Senators are trying to trim a paltry one hundred billion dollars from a seriously bloated and  incredibly expanding “stimulus package,” our President finds it necessary to warn that “if we drag our feet and fail to act, this crisis will turn into a catastrophe.”
 
This morning on “The Washington Post” Op-Ed Page, he crowed that, barring hasty, ill-considered action, “our nation will sink deeper into a crisis, that, at some point, we may not be able to reverse.” Think of that statement for a moment. A crisis we may not be able to reverse? What exactly does that mean? The utter collapse of our entire economic system? Will our civil society, or what is left of it, vanish? Will we be reduced to huddling in the dark in our sod-roofed cabins, scraping out a tattered existence from our three-acre plots? Or will crops no longer grow? Will the sun die out? Will Obama fail to deliver on his promise to halt the rising sea levels? Will human life itself be blotted out from the planet?
 
What exactly does an irreversible crisis mean?
 
On the other hand, dutifully playing my role in a postpartisan culture, let’s give him the benefit of the doubt. After all, he’s only been on the job for a couple of weeks, he doesn’t have a lot of experience, and most of the people he tapped to advise him during the smoothest transition in the history of the world are stuck in line down at the IRS office trying to get an extension.
 
There he is, stuck all alone in the White House, with only Joe Biden to tell him what to do (and Biden keeps saying, “Go back on TV, ‘Rack. You know, like FDR did. Tell them the only thing to fear is confidence itself.”) Then he turns on CSpan and he sees Speaker of the House Nancy Pelosi warning that “every month that we do not have an economic recovery package, 500 million Americans lose their jobs.”
 
 
No wonder he is panicking. Maybe THE SKY REALLY IS FALLING.
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