March 2, 2010
I CRUCIFIED HEALTH CARE:
Health Care Rising: Obama's end game for passing health care reform. (John Dickerson, March 2, 2010, Slate)
If Barack Obama has his way, health care reform will be completed by Easter. That's fitting for a bill that was born on Christmas Eve, died, and that the president hopes will rise again. It's also a story that, like the resurrection of Jesus, calls on its adherents to take a leap of faith into the unseen. In Obama's case, he is selling the not-so-Biblical proposition that people will like health care reform that they don't appear to like right now.
The problem is that Obamessiah's party members are likely to be as steadfast as Christ's disciples were on His way to the Cross.
WHICH MADE W PROUD AND DEMOCRATS ASHAMED:
Rebirth of a Nation: Something that looks an awful lot like democracy is beginning to take hold in Iraq. (Babak Dehghanpisheh, John Barry and Christopher Dickey, NEWSWEEK
Published Feb 26, 2010 , Newsweek)
And yet it has to be said and it should be understood—now, almost seven hellish years later—that something that looks mighty like democracy is emerging in Iraq. And while it may not be a beacon of inspiration to the region, it most certainly is a watershed event that could come to represent a whole new era in the history of the massively undemocratic Middle East.The elections to be held in Iraq on March 7 feature 6,100 parliamentary candidates from all of the country's major sects and many different parties. They have wildly conflicting interests and ambitions. Yet in the past couple of years, these politicians have come to see themselves as part of the same club, where hardball political debate has supplanted civil war and legislation is hammered out, however slowly and painfully, through compromises—not dictatorial decrees or, for that matter, the executive fiats of U.S. occupiers. Although protected, encouraged, and sometimes tutored by Washington, Iraq's political class is now shaping its own system—what Gen. David Petraeus calls "Iraqracy." With luck, the politics will bolster the institutions through which true democracy thrives.
One continuing problem is that it is still a country rather than a nation and even developed societies have trouble holding them together.
IN WHAT SENSE ARE THEY THEN A CATHOLIC EDUCATIONAL INSTITUTION?:
Sexual Orientation and the Catholic Church (Dr. Charles E. Rice, March 2, 2010, Ignatius Insight)
Editor's Note: The following column by Dr. Rice was written for publication in the Notre Dame Observer, which Dr. Rice has written a bi-weekly column for since 1992. He was informed by the Observer that this column would not be published because of concerns about its language and whether or not it would lead to a "productive discussion". Ignatius Insight believes that frank articulation of Church doctrine is the perfect basis for productive discussion, and so is happy to publish the column. [...]1. Homosexual acts are always objectively wrong. The starting point is the Catechism: "Homosexuality refers to relations between men or between women who experience an exclusive or predominant sexual attraction to persons of the same sex. It has taken a great variety of forms through the centuries and in different cultures. Its psychological genesis remains largely unexplained. Basing itself on Sacred Scripture, which presents homosexual acts as acts of grave depravity, Tradition has always declared that 'homosexual acts are intrinsically disordered.' They are contrary to the natural law. They close the sexual act to the gift of life. They do not proceed from a genuine affective and sexual complementarity. Under no circumstances can they be approved" (No. 2357). [...]
2. Since homosexual acts are "intrinsically disordered," the inclination toward those acts is disordered. An inclination to commit any morally disordered act, whether theft, fornication or whatever, is a disordered inclination. "The number of men and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies," says the Catechism, "is not negligible. This inclination, which is objectively disordered, constitutes for most of them a trial" (No. 2358). That inclination, however, is not in itself a sin. [...]
4. "[M]en and women who have deep-seated homosexual tendencies.... are called to fulfill God's will in their lives, and, if they are Christians, to unite to the sacrifice of the Lord's Cross the difficulties they may encounter from their condition.... Homosexual persons are called to chastity. By the virtues of self-mastery that teach them inner freedom, at times by the support of disinterested friendship, by prayer and sacramental grace, they can and should gradually and resolutely approach Christian perfection" (Catechism, nos. 2358, 2359).
SEEPAGE:
The Incredible Deflation of Barack Obama (Mortimer B. Zuckerman, January 21, 2010, US News)
[H]e has accelerated the deflation of hope with his extraordinary volume of public appearances. In his first six months, he gave three times as many interviews as George W. Bush, four times as many prime-time news conferences as Bill Clinton, and more interviews than both combined: 93 for Obama and 61 for his two immediate predecessors. He appeared on five Sunday talk shows on the same morning, followed the next day by David Letterman, the first-ever presidential appearance on a nighttime comedy show. In another week, he squeezed in addresses to the U.S. Climate Change Summit, the U.N. General Assembly, the U.N. Security Council, and a variety of press conferences.His promiscuity on TV has made him seem as if he is still a candidate instead of president and commander in chief. He—and his advisers—have failed to appreciate that national TV speeches are best reserved for those moments when the country faces a major crisis or a war. Now he faces the iron law of diminishing novelty.
Despite this apparent accessibility, Obama's reliance on a teleprompter for flawless delivery made for boring and unemotional TV, compounding his cerebral and unemotional style. He has seemed not close but distant, not engaged but detached. Is it any wonder that the mystique of his presidency has eroded so that fewer people have listened to each successive foray? The columnist Richard Cohen wryly observed that he won the Pulitzer Prize for being the only syndicated columnist who did not have an exclusive interview with the president.
Poor results. But Obama's problems are more than a question of style. There is doubt aroused on substance. He sets deadlines and then lets too many pass. He announces a strategic review of Afghanistan, describing it as "a war of necessity," only to become less sure to the point that he didn't even seem committed to the policy that he finally announced. As for changing politics in Washington, he assigned the drafting of central legislative programs not to cabinet departments or White House staff but to the Democratic congressional leadership of Nancy Pelosi and Harry Reid, the very people so mistrusted by the public. Who could be surprised that the critical bills—the stimulus program and healthcare—degenerated under a welter of pork and earmarks that had so outraged the American public in the past?
THE LEGALS ARE ILLEGAL TOO:
United States deports Australian Tracey Washington over school squabble (The Daily Telegraph, March 03, 2010)
Tracey Washington and her two sons, aged 13 and 5, will be kicked out on Friday under a controversial San Francisco policy that forced the city's juvenile authorities to turn the elder child over to federal US Immigration and Customs officials.Mrs Washington moved to San Francisco from Melbourne in February last year to marry Charles Washington, 42, whom she met on holidays six years ago.
However, Mrs Washington and the boys were declared illegal immigrants in May after she missed the cut-off to apply for a green card. Mrs Washington claims immigration officials gave her the wrong deadline.
SO EASY EVEN PAKISTAN CAN DO IT:
Pakistan Seizes Insurgent Stronghold on Afghan Border (ZAHID HUSSAIN, 3/02/10, WSJ)
Pakistani forces have seized a key al Qaeda and Taliban stronghold along the border with Afghanistan that once served as a hideout for Ayman al Zawahiri, second-in-command to Osama bin Laden.The capture of Damadola, a district in the Bajaur tribal region, is a major success in Pakistan's counterinsurgency campaign. The area had long been dominated by insurgents operating on both sides of the Pakistan-Afghanistan border.
Instability is our friend.
WAY TO SLAP THE FIRST LADY DOWN:
Shhh, Don't Tell the First Lady (Karen Travers and Sunlen Miller, 3/02/10, ABC News)
Just days after his doctors expressed concerns about his rising cholesterol levels, President Obama dropped by a family-style restaurant for an authentic – but perhaps not so healthy – Southern style lunch in Savannah, Georgia.In between events, Obama paid a visit to Mrs. Wilkes' Dining Room and made it clear he did not want to hear it from the press about his choice of lunch.
“I don’t want any lectures about my cholesterol,” Obama said. “Don’t tell Michelle.”
He must think he's Charles Barkley.
ON THE BRIGHT SIDE...:
Hague on the Falklands (Bagehot Mar 2nd 2010, The Economist)
Hilary Clinton was asked about the Falklands during a visit to Argentina yesterday, and said this:we want very much to encourage both countries to sit down. Now, we cannot make either one do so, but we think it is the right way to proceed. So we will be saying this publicly, as I have been, and we will continue to encourage exactly the kind of discussion across the table that needs to take place.
This despite the fact that Ms Clinton must know the British government has very little intention of negotiating anything.
I have hesitated to read drastic slights into the sometimes awkward diplomacy between Barack Obama and Gordon Brown. But this stance on the Falklands cannot be seen any other way. It really is no way for the Americans to treat their most important military ally—as some in America doubtless appreciate.
...the Administration tends to stab our allies in the chest, not the back.
ON TO IOWA:
Jindal develops extensive campaign organization (The Associated Press, 3/02/10)
For his re-election bid, Gov. Bobby Jindal has tapped into an extensive network of Republican fundraising and consulting firms known for their work for GOP candidates and causes around the country.Jindal is seeking a second term as governor, but he’s also assembled the type of campaign organization and connections that reach far beyond his home state — and that could help launch future political campaigns on a national stage.
An Associated Press review of the Jindal campaign’s most recent finance report shows nearly half its spending in 2009 — at least $431,000 — paid for the web of out-of-state consultants, strategists, direct mail companies and fundraising coordinators. Jindal’s campaign spent $911,000 in 2009, two years before the election.
The companies and fundraisers hired, in many instances, are prominent in national Republican politics, linked to an array of high-profile candidates, conservative groups and party leaders. They’ve done work for former President George W. Bush, former GOP presidential candidate John McCain, the Republican National Committee, conservative political action committees and Republican governors, senators and congressmen in dozens of states.
"SINCERE, COMPELLING, ARTICULATE -- AND WRONG":
The Vocation of Christians in American Public Life (Archbishop Chaput, March 1, 2010, Houston Baptist University)
One of the ironies in my talk tonight is this. I'm a Catholic bishop, speaking at a Baptist university in America's Protestant heartland. But I've been welcomed with more warmth and friendship than I might find at a number of Catholic venues. This is a fact worth discussing. I'll come back to it at the end of my comments. [...]The historian Paul Johnson once wrote that America was “born Protestant.” That's clearly true. Whatever America is today or may become tomorrow, its origin was deeply shaped by a Protestant Christian spirit, and the fruit of that spirit has been, on the balance, a great blessing for humanity. But it's also true that, while Catholics have always thrived in the United States, they lived through two centuries of discrimination, religious bigotry and occasional violence. Protestants of course will remember things quite differently. They will remember Catholic persecution of dissenters in Europe, the entanglements of the Roman Church and state power, and papal suspicion of democracy and religious liberty.
We can't erase those memories. And we cannot – nor should we try to – paper over the issues that still divide us as believers in terms of doctrine, authority and our understandings of the Church. Ecumenism based on good manners instead of truth is empty. It's also a form of lying. If we share a love of Jesus Christ and a familial bond in baptism and God’s Word, then on a fundamental level, we're brothers and sisters. Members of a family owe each other more than surface courtesies. We owe each other the kind of fraternal respect that “speak[s] the truth in love” (Eph 4:15). We also urgently owe each other solidarity and support in dealing with a culture that increasingly derides religious faith in general, and the Christian faith in particular. And that brings me to the heart of what I want to share with you.
Our theme tonight is the vocation of Christians in American public life. That’s a pretty broad canvas. Broad enough that I wrote a book about it. Tonight I want to focus in a special way on the role of Christians in our country’s civic and political life. The key to our discussion will be that word “vocation.” It comes from the Latin word vocare, which means, “to call.” Christians believe that God calls each of us individually, and all of us as a believing community, to know, love and serve him in our daily lives.
But there’s more. He also asks us to make disciples of all nations. That means we have a duty to preach Jesus Christ. We have a mandate to share his Gospel of truth, mercy, justice and love. These are mission words; action words. They’re not optional. And they have practical consequences for the way we think, speak, make choices and live our lives, not just at home but in the public square. Real Christian faith is always personal, but it’s never private. And we need to think about that simple fact in light of an anniversary.
Fifty years ago this fall, in September 1960, Sen. John F. Kennedy, the Democratic candidate for president, spoke to the Greater Houston Ministerial Association. He had one purpose. He needed to convince 300 uneasy Protestant ministers, and the country at large, that a Catholic like himself could serve loyally as our nation’s chief executive. Kennedy convinced the country, if not the ministers, and went on to be elected. And his speech left a lasting mark on American politics. It was sincere, compelling, articulate – and wrong. Not wrong about the patriotism of Catholics, but wrong about American history and very wrong about the role of religious faith in our nation’s life. And he wasn’t merely “wrong.” His Houston remarks profoundly undermined the place not just of Catholics, but of all religious believers, in America’s public life and political conversation. Today, half a century later, we’re paying for the damage.
TAX WHAT WE DON'T WANT:
Poll: Majority of Ga. voters support hiking cigarette tax (Walter Jones, 3/02/10, Morris News Service)
A coalition of non-smoking groups released the results of a survey Tuesday morning showing that 71 percent of Georgia likely voters questioned support a $1 increase in the tax on a pack of cigarettes.Rep. Ron Stephens, a Savannah pharmacist and member of the Republican House leadership, is the sponsor of House Bill 39 nicknamed “pass the buck” to boost the tax.
AND YOU WONDER WHY TIPPER GORE SLEEPS SO LIGHTLY?:
Baby girl survives after being shot in the chest in parents' 'global warming suicide pact' (Gerard Couzens, 01st March 2010, Daily Mail)
A seven-month-old baby girl survived three days alone with a bullet in her chest beside the bodies of her parents and toddler brother.Argentines Francisco Lotero, 56, and Miriam Coletti, 23, shot their children before killing themselves after making an apparent suicide pact over fears about global warming.
Their son Francisco, two, died instantly after being hit in the back.
But their unnamed daughter cheated death after the bullet from her dad's handgun missed her vital organs.
INDEED, HE MAY HAVE HATED THE THREAT OF NUCLEAR WAR MORE THAN HE HATED COMMUNISM:
Ronald Reagan’s “Secret” Crusade: A review of Martin Anderson and Annelise Anderson’s Reagan’s Secret War: The Untold Story of His Fight to Save the World from Nuclear Disaster (Lee Edwards - 03/02/10, First Principles)
Over the past decade, the Andersons (with the initial assistance of political scientist Kiron Skinner) have published three thick volumes documenting Reagan’s core contributions and ideas: Reagan, In His Own Hand: The Writings of Ronald Reagan That Reveal His Revolutionary Vision for America (2001); Reagan: A Life in Letters (2003); and now their latest, Reagan’s Secret War: The Untold Story of His Fight to Save the World from Nuclear Disaster.Reagan’s Secret War is a model of archival research and clear writing, characterized by a welcome willingness to let the principals tell their sorry without unnecessary commentary by the authors. It is an indispensable addition to the literature about one of the most consequential presidents in American history.
In his foreword,former secretary of state George P. Shultz reveals that while President Reagan was as firm an anti-Communist as could be found on the planet and was resolved to end the Cold War by winning it, he was also convinced that all nuclear weapons should be abolished. He loathed the policy of MAD—Mutual Assured Destruction—saying, “What’s so good about a peace kept by the threat of destroying each other?” His solution was the elimination of U.S. and Soviet nuclear weapons, coupled with the Strategic Defense Initiative (SDI), which would keep America safe in the event of a nuclear attack by rogue governments.
Reagan and GorbachevThe true test of a presidency, Shultz writes, is whether the ideas promulgated have “staying power.” Reagan’s idea of abolishing nuclear weapons in conjunction with SDI, although questioned and even opposed by experts within his administration and by skeptical conservatives such as William F. Buckley Jr., continues to attract support at home and abroad.
ONE DANGED PECULIAR COUNTRY:
Americans Love Israel Even More Than You Think (Barry Rubin, 3/02/10)
International relations isn’t a popularity contest. But public opinion polls can be useful in countering myths and examining the impact of policymaker, elite, and media campaigns on the masses.Which brings us to Gallup’s latest poll measuring how Americans feel about different countries. The more one examines the results, the more amazing they are. Americans two favorites are, not surprisingly, fellow English-speakers Canada and the United Kingdom. Then come—Americans are very forgiving—two former enemies, Germany and Japan.
And next on the list is Israel.
Our fellow Anglospheric states are easy enough to figure and the old Israel, but it's passing odd how much we like our old enemies. One wonders if we now consider them kind of client states.
THE OIL WILL STILL BE GUSHING WHEN THE SUN BLINKS OUT:
Oil demand threatened by big shift to green policies (Chris Stanton, March 02. 2010, The National)
Proposed policies that target carbon emissions by shifting energy sources away from oil and other fossil fuels are some of the most important variables in the oil markets, said Amy Myers, an energy expert at Rice University’s James A Baker III Institute for Public Policy in Texas, which will publish a major study on the topic this year.In the US, the world’s largest oil consumer, the effects of policies on the table to raise fuel efficiency and encourage electric cars and renewable energy could range from having barely any impact, to reducing consumption by as much as 7 or 8 million barrels per day (bpd) after 2020, Ms Myers said in Abu Dhabi. That is equal to as much as 40 per cent of daily US consumption today.
“People have planned their vision for where they’re going to be in 2025, and that we’re going to have a shortage in the market,” she said. “Well, if the United States could eliminate 6 to 7 million bpd through policy, that would wipe out whatever gain you could imagine from China.”
Ms Myers said China was also likely to improve the efficiency of its oil use faster than experts had predicted.
ARE THERE NO LYNCH LAWS IN GYNOTOPIA?:
NOW calls for NY Gov. Paterson to resign (AP, 3/02/10)
The National Organization for Women is urging New York Gov. David Paterson to resign because of a report he directed two staffers to contact a woman about a domestic violence case involving one of his top aides.
This is the same NOW that didn't mind that Bill Clinton tried to suborn perjury and obstructed justice after he assaulted a woman personally? Why does the black guy get held to a different standard?
NEWS FROM GENEVA:
Islamic Scholar Issues Anti-Terrorism Fatwa (Mark White, 3/02/10, Sky News)
A prominent Islamic scholar will use a speech in London to issue a 600-page religious edict, denouncing terrorists and suicide bombers as "unbelievers".Muhammad Tahir ul Qadri is a leading figure who has promoted peace and interfaith dialogue for 30 years.
He said he felt compelled to issue the fatwa because of concerns about the radicalisation of British Muslims at university campuses and because there had been a lack of condemnation of extremism by Muslim clerics and scholars.
Ul Qadri says his fatwa, which is aimed at persuading young Muslims to turn their backs on extremism, goes further than any previous denunciation.
"This is the first, most comprehensive fatwa on the subject of terrorism ever written," said ul Qadri, who has written about 350 books on Islamic scholarship.
WAIT, WE'RE REVERTING TO WHAT THE LAW SAYS?:
Court weighs if silence alone can invoke Miranda (JESSE J. HOLLAND, 3/02/10, Associated Press)
After two and a half hours of interrogation, Thompkins answered three questions, said Justice Stephen Breyer: "One, do you believe in God? Yes. Two, do you pray to God? Yes. Three, have you asked God for forgiveness for shooting the boy? Yes."OK," Breyer said. "So, where did he waive it?"
"When he answered those questions," Restuccia said.
Thompkins' lawyer, Elizabeth Jacobs, told the justices they should say that police should stop all interrogation if they don't get the suspect to say that he wants to talk. If they don't, police will keep suspects in interrogation rooms and badger them until they talk, she said.
But what, Chief Justice John Roberts asked, if a police officer asked a suspect if he wants to remain silent, and he doesn't say anything?
"Then he is not cooperating, he is not waiving his rights, it's not voluntary. Take him back to the cell, that's it," she said.
"What you are saying then," asked Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg," is the defendant never has to invoke his right?"
"There is no clearly established law that says that he has to assert his right to remain silent," Jacobs said.
There's no law giving you a right to remain silent in the first place.
WE'RE THE DEMOCRATS, AND WE'RE HERE TO HELP....THE AFFLUENT:
Charter Schools Lose in L.A.: The City of Angels lets teachers’ unions keep control of its worst campuses. (Marcus A. Winters, 3/02/10, National Review)
Charter-school operators were an obvious choice to run the struggling schools. Charter schools are public schools that are not subject to the burdensome restrictions imposed by collective-bargaining agreements, which spell out all the tasks that teachers can’t be required to do and make it impossible to remove even the most ineffective instructors. Eager to expand, Los Angeles charter-school operators excitedly applied to run the failing schools.But the local teachers’ union, the United Teachers of Los Angeles, didn’t relish the prospect of transferring public schools to charter-school operators and their non-unionized teaching staffs. So the union helped groups of teachers submit their own proposals to run the schools, which suggested some changes to the schools’ operations but didn’t change the fact that the teachers would be covered by the city’s union contract. A separate group, led by Mayor Antonio Villaraigosa, also submitted applications; it too proposed to keep the schools subject to the existing union contract.
In the end, the school board awarded 28 schools to the union-sponsored groups, two schools to the mayor’s group, and one to a nonprofit. Only seven will be run by charters — and they don’t include any of the 13 failing schools. This is a huge missed opportunity. Freedom from the teachers’ unions is precisely what makes charter schools so good.
ONE OF THESE THINGS IS NOT LIKE THE OTHER:
The System Works, Even if These Bozos Don’t (Stanley Kutler, 3/02/10, Truth Dig)
Dwight Eisenhower swept to victory in the 1952 presidential election, carrying with him a Republican Party that had been rejected for 20 years. The Republican majority proved short-lived, and for the last six years of Eisenhower’s two terms he worked with a Democratic Congress. He governed effectively, aided, no doubt, by the fact that real congressional power often belonged to the alliance between Republicans and Southern Democrats. (That alliance fell apart years later when the Republican Party, in true bipartisan fashion, overwhelmingly supported civil rights legislation in 1964-65.)Richard Nixon, who took pride in his “firsts,” had the dubious distinction of being the first president elected twice without carrying his party to power in Congress. Still, Nixon governed effectively for the most part until his self-inflicted wound. Conflict and hostility surely existed, yet Nixon and Congress agreed on some notable legislation. The same holds for Ronald Reagan, whose party never controlled the House during his terms, and ruled the Senate only sporadically.
And W didn't win back the Senate--after the Jeffords switch--until '02, yet passed everything from tax cuts to NCLB. And Bill Clinton's successes as president came only when working with the GOP, in the minority and then the majority.
The UR too is only likely to start governing well once government is divided.
THAT MANY DROWNING PEOPLE NEED A BIG LIFE RAFT:
China holds more U.S. debt than indicated (David M. Dickson, 3/02/10, Washington Times))
"The U.S. Treasury data almost certainly understate Chinese holdings of our government debt because [the U.S. figures] do not reveal the ultimate country of ownership when [debt] instruments are held through an intermediary in another jurisdiction," Simon Johnson, an economics professor at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, told the U.S.-China Economic and Security Review Commission, a bipartisan forum established by Congress in 2000 to monitor the security implications of the U.S. economic relationship with China.Mr. Johnson told the commission last week that "a great deal" of last year's $170 billion increase in Treasury holdings by the United Kingdom "may be due to China placing offshore dollars in London-based banks" and then using the funds to purchase Treasury debt.
Mr. Johnson, a former chief economist for the International Monetary Fund, estimated that China owns about $1 trillion in U.S. Treasury securities, or nearly half the $2.37 trillion stock of Treasury debt held by "foreign official" owners.
The amount of U.S. debt held by China is even higher than that, said Eswar Prasad, an economist at Cornell University.
WHAT DIRT DOES RAHMBO HAVE ON THE EDITORS AT THE POST?...:
Hotheaded Emanuel may be White House voice of reason (Jason Horowitz, 3/02/10, Washington Post)
In December 2008, Obama, Emanuel and Republican Sens. John McCain (Ariz.) and Lindsey O. Graham (S.C.) met in Obama's transition headquarters in Chicago to discuss detainee policy. According to Graham, Obama turned to him at one point and said, " 'I'm going to need your help closing Guantanamo Bay. . . . I want you and Rahm to start talking.' " They did, and as the discussions progressed, Emanuel grew wary that closing the U.S. military prison in Cuba was possible without opening a slew of other politically sensitive national security problems " 'This stuff is like flypaper,' " Graham recalled Emanuel saying. " 'It will stick to you.' "Graham said Emanuel was well aware that his and any other Republican support for closing Guantanamo Bay hinged on keeping alleged Sept. 11 mastermind Khalid Sheik Mohammed out of civilian court.
According to a person familiar with the conversations, who discussed the confidential deliberation on the condition of anonymity, Emanuel made his case to Obama, articulating the political dangers of a civilian trial to congressional Democrats. Attorney General Eric H. Holder Jr. presented a counterargument rooted in principle, for civilian trials.
David Axelrod, senior adviser to Obama, supported Holder, the source said. The president agreed that letting the Justice Department take the lead was the right thing to do.
"Axelrod has a strong view of the historic character Obama is supposed to be," said an early Obama supporter who is close to the president and spoke on the condition of anonymity to give a frank assessment of frustration with the White House. The source blamed Obama's charmed political life for creating a self-confidence and trust in principle that led to an "indifference to doing the small, marginal things a White House could do to mitigate the problems on the Hill. Rahm knows the geography better."
Emanuel and Axelrod declined to comment for this article.
"During this whole civilian-trial debate, Rahm's gut instincts knew that taking KSM to New York for civilian trials was going to be a misstep," Graham said. "He has a better ear for domestic politics on this issue than anybody in the administration, quite frankly."
...nevermind on the UR, who really needs to fire a Chief of Staff who has shown himself not just incompetent but James Baker/Dick Darman-level self-serving.
GIPPER LITE:
Obama angers union officials with remarks in support of R.I. teacher firings (Michael A. Fletcher and Nick Anderson, 3/02/10, Washington Post)
President Obama voiced support Monday for the mass firings of educators at a failing Rhode Island school, drawing an immediate rebuke from teachers union officials whose members have chafed at some of his education policies. [...]The board that oversees Central Falls High School took the startling step last week of firing 93 teachers and other staff members after the teachers union refused to agree to a plan for them to work a longer school day and provide after-school tutoring without much extra pay.
American Federation of Teachers President Randi Weingarten, whose union represents the faculty in Central Falls, one of the poorest districts in Rhode Island, responded forcefully to Obama's remarks.
"We know it is tempting for people in Washington to score political points by scapegoating teachers, but it does nothing to give our students and teachers the tools they need to succeed," she said in a joint statement with other union officials.