Bitch About Obama

By Rick Klein, ABC

 Obama plans to take on the evil insurance companies by giving them more business

ABC’s Z. Byron Wolf reports: President Obama and Democrats launched a campaign to vilify insurance companies in the final stretch of their health reform effort.

Republicans, meanwhile, pointed out that those very same insurance companies would get huge checks from the government if health reform is enacted.

“(Health Insurers) will keep on doing this for as long as they can get away with it. This is no secret,” the president said. “They’re telling their investors this – ‘We are in the money.  We are going to keep on making big profits even though a lot of folks are going to be put under hardship,’” the President told supporters at a stop in Pennsylvania today.

HHS Secretary Kathleen Sebelius, meanwhile, wrote to insurance company executives demanding that they justify premium hikes.

Neither mentioned that the Senate health reform bill, which is the basis for Democrats’ last best chance at comprehensive reform, would give the insurance companies millions of new customers required by law to buy health insurance. It would also require insurers to cover everyone, regardless of age, gender or pre-existing condition.

To help pay for the new insurance requirements the government would give to people money to buy insurance – $336 billion over the next ten years. That money, ultimately, would have to go to… drum roll… insurance companies.

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Posted by Tom Bevan | Email This | Permalink | Email Author

The White House needs this like it needs a hole in the head. After a brutal week for Democrats that included David Paterson’s ongoing implosion in New York and Charlie Rangel (in)voluntarily turning over his gavel due to a string of never-ending ethics problems, Rep. Eric Massa’s no-holds barred radio interview yesterday has things picking up right where they left off last Friday – and then some.

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By Simon Heffer, UK Telegraph

 Barack Obama is turning all of America into Detroit

It is a universal political truth that administrations do not begin to fragment when things are going well: it only happens when they go badly, and those who think they know better begin to attack those who manifestly do not. The descent of Barack Obama’s regime, characterised now by factionalism in the Democratic Party and talk of his being set to emulate Jimmy Carter as a one-term president, has been swift and precipitate. It was just 16 months ago that weeping men and women celebrated his victory over John McCain in the American presidential election. If they weep now, a year and six weeks into his rule, it is for different reasons.

Despite the efforts of some sections of opinion to talk the place up, America is mired in unhappiness, all the worse for the height from which Obamania has fallen. The economy remains troublesome. There is growth – a good last quarter suggested an annual rate of as high as six per cent, but that figure is probably not reliable – and the latest unemployment figures, last Friday, showed a levelling off. Yet 15 million Americans, or 9.7 per cent of the workforce, have no job. Many millions more are reduced to working part-time. Whole areas of the country, notably in the north and on the eastern seaboard, are industrial wastelands. The once mighty motor city of Detroit appears slowly to be being abandoned, becoming a Jurassic Park of the mid-20th century; unemployment among black people in Mr Obama’s own city of Chicago is estimated at between 20 and 25 per cent. One senior black politician – a Democrat and a supporter of the President – told me of the wrath in his community that a black president appeared to be unable to solve the economic problem among his own people. Cities in the east such as Newark and Baltimore now have drug-dealing as their principal commercial activity: The Wire is only just fictional.

Last Thursday the House of Representatives passed a jobs Bill, costing $15 billion, which would give tax breaks to firms hiring new staff and, through state sponsorship of construction projects, create thousands of jobs too. The Senate is trying to approve a Bill that would provide a further $150 billion of tax incentives to employers. Yet there is a sense of desperation in the Administration, a sense that nothing can be as efficacious at the moment as a sticking plaster. Edward B Montgomery, deputy labour secretary in the Clinton administration, now spends his time on day trips to decaying towns that used to have a car industry, not so much advising them on how to do something else as facilitating those communities’ access to federal funds. For a land without a welfare state, America starts to do an effective impersonation of a country with one. This massive state spending gives rise to accusations by Republicans, and people too angry even to be Republicans, that America is now controlled by "Leftists" and being turned into a socialist state.

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By TIM GRIEVE, Politico

"Mine is now the deciding vote on the health care bill," Massa, who on Friday announced his intention to resign, said during a long monologue on radio station WKPQ. "And this administration and this House leadership have said, quote-unquote, they will stop at nothing to pass this health care bill. And now they’ve gotten rid of me, and it will pass. You connect the dots."

A spokeswoman for House Majority Leader Steny Hoyer (D-Md.) rejected Massa’s charge out of hand.

"That’s completely false,” said Katie Grant. “There is zero merit to that accusation."

Massa insisted that he did not know the basis of a House ethics committee investigation into his conduct until after he announced his retirement last Wednesday, and he took Hoyer to task for going public with information related to the probe before it is completed.

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By Barak Ravid, Haaretz

 Obama is getting cozy with the Palestinians

The U.S. administration will not put a lot of effort into the upcoming indirect negotiations between Israel and the Palestinians, opting instead to focus on the November Congressional elections, according to an internal Foreign Ministry report that was distributed to Israeli diplomatic missions abroad.

The classified report claims that in the preparatory discussions for the Israeli-Palestinian proximity talks the Obama administration adopted positions that are closer to Palestinian demands.

"The recent American statements point to the adoption of wording in line, even if partially and cautiously, with Palestinian demands in regard to the framework and structure of negotiations," the report stated. "Still, the [U.S.] administration is making sure to avoid commenting on its position on core issues."

U.S. Mideast envoy George Mitchell arrived in Israel last night for what is expected to be a final series of talks before the official announcement of the resumption of talks between Israel and the Palestinian Authority, in an indirect format.

The proximity talks are to continue for four months. They will involve Mitchell going between Jerusalem and Ramallah, relaying messages and responses, or, alternatively, talks in either Washington or Europe.

Mitchell met with Defense Minister Ehud Barak last night and is scheduled to meet with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on Sunday. Mitchel is slated to meet with Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas Monday in hopes of announcing the resumption of talks immediately afterward, Monday night.

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Newsmax

 The battle is on for control of the White House

In the days of the old Pravda, one could determine who was winning secret Politburo power struggles by just looking at the official Soviet newspaper. Those winning simply got better press.

Perhaps it may be no different here in the United States.

This week two of the heaviest guns in American media, The Washington Post and The New York Times, unloaded their missiles at Obama adviser David Axelrod while heralding White House chief of staff Rahm Emanuel as a centrist and pragmatist.

This Sunday’s New York Times, for example, features Axelrod and describes him as the ideological courtier advising the president into darkness as Emanuel remains the level-headed counselor.

Here’s an excerpt from “Message Maven Finds Fingers Pointing at Him”:

“Recent news reports have cast the White House chief of staff, Rahm Emanuel, as the administration’s chief pragmatist, and Mr. Axelrod, by implication, as something of a swooning loyalist. ‘I’ve heard him be called a “Moonie,”’ dismissed Mr. Axelrod’s close friend, former Commerce Secretary William Daley. Or as the White House press secretary, Robert Gibbs, joked, ‘the guy who walks in front of the president with rose petals.

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By Gautham Nagesh – The Daily Caller

 Will Obama and Holder cave to liberal pressure?

News that the Obama administration may revert to a military tribunal to prosecute the mastermind behind the Sept. 11, 2001 attacks was roundly denounced by the left on Friday, with liberals voicing their frustration at the White House’s willingness to embrace the same strategy for trying suspected terrorists as the Bush administration.

The Washington Post reported Friday that the president’s advisers are nearing a recommendation to prosecute Khalid Sheikh Mohammed in a military tribunal rather than a civilian court. The recommendation would fly in the face of Attorney General Eric Holder’s plan to try the self-described mastermind behind 9/11 in a New York City civilian court. The White House has claimed that any decision on the trial is weeks away, but that didn’t stop the liberal blogosphere from erupting in pre-emptive indignation over the White House’s apparent flip-flop.

Liberal firebrand Glenn Greenwald denounced the proposal today, accusing the White House of favoring political expediency over the rule of law. Greenwald compared the decision to the the alleged politicization of the Department of Justice under President Bush and cited several instances in which Obama has reversed his position on national security issues to avoid being labeled soft on terror.

“Although they will try, it will be extremely difficult even for his most devoted loyalists to deny the fundamental cowardice of Barack Obama,” wrote Greenwald. “Even just as a political matter, is there any better way to ensure that Americans will view him as weak than by abandoning one key decision after the next as a result of the slightest pressure?

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By Mike Riggs, The Daily Caller

 Jay-z is running this town from the situation room

Rapper Jay-Z’s apparent visit to the White House Situation Room Wednesday reveals a radical departure from the last eight years of security policy, according to a senior Bush administration official.

According to photos released by an anonymous twitter user, Jay-Z, along with his entourage and his wife Beyonce, visited the White House Wednesday before a concert in Washington, D.C. During the visit, Jay-Z and company were apparently allowed access to the Situation Room. Photos from the visit feature Jay-Z sitting at the head of the table in the Situation Room under the president’s seal.

Historically, the Situation Room requires a high level of clearance due to the presence of sensitive information. “I believe the only exceptions had to be okay’d by either the chief of staff, national security adviser or the deputy chief of staff,” the Bush official wrote in an e-mail.

An e-mail to the White House asking if the pictures do in fact show Jay-Z in the Situation Room has not been returned.

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By Jed Eckert

 Rev. Wright is a living legend in his own mind

Saw this story last night on The O’Reilly Factor and Mediaite, so I started digging as well. One thing is for sure, Rev. Wright may have one of the biggest egos in the country.

On March 5, 2010, Minister Louis Farrakhan, The Rev. Dr. Jeremiah Wright, Pastor Emeritus, Trinity United Church of Christ, and Father Michael Pfleger, The Community of St. Sabina, are being honored as Living Legends.
The press release was issued on Rev. Wright’s website.

The proceeds will supposedly benefit the Kwame Nkrumah Academy, Trinity Child Care Centers, Inc., Saint Sabina Academy and Yele Haiti. Admission runs anywhere from general admission for $40 to $100 for a VIP ticket.

But who is actually honoring these men? See if you can follow this… While the release comes from Rev. Wright’s website, the event appears to be sponsored by something called “Grace of God, NFP.”

I have seen Grace of God, NFP listed in the category of “Publishing Consultants Services” headquartered at 17601 Arlington Lane, Hazel Crest, IL. Now, according to Wright’s own press release, Jeri L. Wright is the president and CEO of Grace of God, NFP! Jeri is Rev. Wright’s daughter and GoG, NFP handles publicity for Rev. Wright’s books.
So, it would appear as though Rev. Wright is really honoring himself!

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By Mark Steyn, National Review

 Mr. Cool wants to greatly increase the size of government

So there was President Obama giving his bazillionth speech on health care, droning yet again that “now is the hour when we must seize the moment,” the same moment he’s been seizing every day of the week for the past year, only this time his genius photo-op guys thought it would look good to have him surrounded by men in white coats.

Why is he doing this? Why let “health” “care” “reform” stagger on like the rotting husk in a low-grade creature feature who refuses to stay dead no matter how many stakes you pound through his chest?

Because it’s worth it. Big time. I’ve been saying in this space for two years that the governmentalization of health care is the fastest way to a permanent left-of-center political culture. It redefines the relationship between the citizen and the state in fundamental ways that make limited government all but impossible. In most of the rest of the Western world, there are still nominally “conservative” parties, and they even win elections occasionally, but not to any great effect (let’s not forget that Jacques Chirac was, in French terms, a “conservative”). The result is a kind of two-party one-party state: Right-of-center parties will once in a while be in office, but never in power, merely presiding over vast left-wing bureaucracies that cruise on regardless.

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