Ouch! (and Darn!)

As I noted before, the great and grand hope of President Obama would be that EUROPE WOULD LIKE US AGAIN! Now, I stand by my statements that it doesn't matter what Europe, or anyone else thinks, but it would have at least been nice if he could get them to, you know, stand beside us and fight a little or something. But it was not to be:

Barack Obama made an impassioned plea to America’s allies to send more
troops to Afghanistan, warning that failure to do so would leave Europe
vulnerable to more terrorist atrocities.
But though he continued to dazzle
Europeans on his debut international tour, the Continent’s leaders turned their
backs on the US President.

Gordon Brown was the only one to offer substantial help. He offered to
send several hundred extra British soldiers to provide security during the
August election, but even that fell short of the thousands of combat troops that
the US was hoping to prise from the Prime Minister.
Just two other allies
made firm offers of troops. Belgium offered to send 35 military trainers and
Spain offered 12. Mr Obama’s host, Nicolas Sarkozy, refused his request.

Poor Barack pulled out all the stops to convince them to do more. He tried hope:

The derisory response threatened to tarnish Mr Obama’s European tour, which
yesterday included a spellbinding performance in Strasbourg in which he offered
the world a vision of a future free of nuclear weapons.

He tried lecturing:

Mr Obama – who has pledged 21,000 more troops to combat the growing insurgency
and is under pressure from generals to supply up to 10,000 more – used the eve
of Nato’s 60th anniversary summit to declare bluntly that it was time for allies
to do their share. “Europe should not simply expect the United States to
shoulder that burden alone,” he said. “This is a joint problem it requires a
joint effort.”

He even tried outright threats:

He said that failing to support the US surge would leave Europe open to a fresh
terrorist offensive. “It is probably more likely that al-Qaeda would be able to
launch a serious terrorist attack on Europe than on the United States because of
proximity,” he said.

But, alas, no more help from our friends abroad than when that detestible, mentally retarded, chimpy, cowboy (spits on the ground in disgust) was in office. This must be Bush's fault, somehow.

Is new DNC chair Tim Kaine really even a democrat?

According to Tennessee Guerilla Women,

President-elect Obama has chosen anti choice,
pro abstinence education, anti
embryonic stem cell research, anti labor, anti
union, anti
same-sex marriage and anti civil union Tim Kaine to chair the DNC

.

Hmm, how interesting.

"Ditch the Bible. Just Do as Barack Does"

Michelle Malkin carries stories from the Washington Post about parents using a "what would Barack Obama do"? approach to encourage their children to do everything from read to brush their teeth.

You could call it Obama discipline or Obama etiquette, and it goes
something like this:

Get up! Do you think Obama would have slept late and not made it to school
on time?

Why don't you guys share? Don't you think Obama would want you to share?

How much did you read? Obama would have finished the book by now.

Do you think Obama would sneak cigarettes? (Oops.)

Well, if teenagers still rebel like I remember them, I sense a whole slew of up and coming Republicans.

According to Charles Krauthammer, the Real Barack Obama cares little about foreign policy or economics, and seeks power to "transform"

Krauthammer says:

As Obama revealingly said just last week, "This painful crisis also
provides us with an opportunity to transform our economy to improve the lives of
ordinary people." Transformation is his mission. Crisis provides the
opportunity. The election provides him the power.

According to Krauthammer, the Bush administration has already laid the groundwork for a New Deal style federal interventionism, and the bailouts already in place will result in "undreamed of amounts of money at Obama's disposal."

It begins with a near $1 trillion stimulus package. This is where Obama
will show himself ideologically. It is his one great opportunity to plant the
seeds for everything he cares about: a new green economy, universal health care,
a labor resurgence, government as benevolent private-sector "partner." The first
hint came yesterday, when Obama claimed, "If we want to overcome our economic
challenges, we must also finally address our health care challenge" -- the
perfect non sequitur that gives carte blanche to whatever health-care reform and
spending the Obama team dreams up. It is the community organizer's ultimate
dream.

Read the whole thing. My only complaint is that it provides little guidance as to what this change will be. Obama has been nothing if not unpredicatable from the start, and right now, I have no idea what "change" means.

Don't worry kids, you can still blame everything bad that ever happens to you ever on racism

Well, this is a relief. For a moment there, I was afraid that the Obama election meant that we were a post-racial society, and a black man can achieve anything that a white man can, even the nation's highest office. Apparently, according to Timothy Noah at Slate, my fears are unfounded:

But in a more complex and indirect way, the stubborn refusal of a majority of whites to vote Democratic is all about race. Take a look at this chart. The alignment of whites with the Republican Party hasn't made it impossible for Democrats to win presidential elections, but it has made it fairly difficult. For the past 40 years, whites have made up 74 percent to somewhere north of 90 percent of all voters. Jimmy Carter got elected president by narrowing to four percentage points the gap between whites voting Republican and whites voting Democratic. Bill Clinton did it by narrowing the gap to a remarkable 2 percent. I don't think it's a coincidence that both men drew some appeal simply from being white Southerners. The South is where the GOP holds its tightest grip on the white vote.

So, at least South still equals racist, even with a black president. Jesse Jackson will be so relieved.

Obama Campaign Workers Upset About Not Getting Paid All That They Earned

I guess that we can safely assume that most of these folks have never earned (or even seen) an actual paycheck:

"Still that's not right. I'm disappointed. I'm glad for the president, but I'm disappointed in this system," said Diane Jefferson, temporary campaign worker.

"It should have been $480. It's $230," said Imani Sankofa.

"They gave us $10 an hour. So we added it. I added up all the hours so it was supposed to be at least $120. All I get is $90," said Charles Martin.

"I worked nine hours a day for 4 days and got paid half of what I should have earned," said Randall Waldon.

But I thought that we were supposed to be getting over the simplistic notions about keeping money that we earn!

Welcome to the real-world kids, welcome to the real world.

BIggest Post-Election Stock Drop in History

From Bloomberg News (via Instapundit):

The stock market posted its biggest plunge following a presidential election as reports on jobs and service industries stoked concern the economy will worsen even as President-elect Barack Obama tries to stimulate growth.

Hang on to that hope and change kids! Pretty soon, it may be all that you've got.

I Support Barack Obama

Now, don’t get me wrong. I don’t want Obama to win this one today. I cast my vote proudly for McCain-Palin, and I wish that I could have done more. I have very low expectations for an Obama presidency. But if he is going to win this thing tonight, and I think that he will, he will be president of my country, the greatest country that has ever been, the country that has given me and my family amazing opportunities, the country that I thank God every night that I am allowed to be a part of. I think that the leaders of this country deserve respect.

The American people are not perfect, and they have not always made the best choices. Such is a risk that you take with a democratic republic. In the face of this new presidency, we must remain vigilant that our freedoms do not expire, we must viciously protect our freedoms of economic opportunity and entrepreneurship, freedoms of expression, freedoms to defend ourselves, even our rights to just make bad decisions. We must viciously defend ourselves against accusations of selfishness for not wanting to from those that fail to do even the minimum without government coercion. We must be aware of those who hide from criticism behind accusations of racism. But these are things that we should always do. Government is a power that is always larger than you; even if that power is wielded by those with whom you agree, it can still be abused, and it will be.

But, if Barack Obama is to be my country’s president, I support him. I will remain vigilant; I will speak out when I think that he is wrong, as I have about Presidents Bush and Clinton before him, but I will also try to give him credit when I think that he is right. I will continue to criticize his supporters, if I think that they have crossed a line, but I will give him, and his office, my respect. If I see supporters on my side attempting to echo the immature behavior of the out of power party of the last 8 years, the name calling, the assassination fantasies, the ridiculous accusations, I will speak out. President Obama is far, far from my choice, but he is not my enemy.

So, when is spellcheck going to start recognizing Barack Obama?

I can keep typing it over and over: Barack Obama, Barack, Obama, . . . surely by now he must be the most blogged about name out there these days. Get with the program, spellchecking programs!

"Don't mind queer eye for the white supremacist guy up there."

Jules Crittenden sees a lot of androgyny in the recently arrested Obama assassination plotting skinheads.

How Dare You Ask a Difficult Question!

So, some local reporter in Orlando had the audacity to ask Joe Biden some fairly pushy questions the other day. (You can see the full video, as well as links to some comments, at Instapundit.)

West wondered about Sen. Barack Obama's comment, to Joe the Plumber, about spreading the wealth. She quoted Karl Marx and asked how Obama isn't being a Marxist with the "spreading the wealth" comment.

"Are you joking?" said Biden, who is Obama's running mate. "No," West said.

West later asked Biden about his comments that Obama could be tested early on as president. She wondered if the Delaware senator was saying America's days as the world's leading power were over.

"I don't know who's writing your questions," Biden shot back.

The Obama campaign's response: You will get no more access to us. None.

Biden so disliked West's line of questioning that the Obama campaign canceled a WFTV interview with Jill Biden, the candidate's wife.

"This cancellation is non-negotiable, and further opportunities for your station to interview with this campaign are unlikely, at best for the duration of the remaining days until the election," wrote Laura K. McGinnis, Central Florida communications director for the Obama campaign.

McGinnis said the Biden cancellation was "a result of her husband's experience yesterday during the satellite interview with Barbara West."

Now, I'm sure that the campaign members can interview or not with whomever they choose, and it really wouldn't bother me too much if they just canceled the interview with Jill. After all, she's just a spouse, and, by the standards of this campaign, a pretty boring one at that. (Quick, name one thing about Jill Biden other than the fact that her husband's on the VP ticket . . . yeah, that's what I thought.)

But the blanket "No Interview For You" statement should give us a major pause. True, there's no real "free speech" issue here- the First Amendment was certainly not violated, as I said, the campaign members can interview with whomever they want. But I think that we need to think about how the members of this campaign feel about people who ask tough questions. Will the Obama presidency limit their interviews to only those who they know will be friendly? Will those that dare to step out of line and ask tough questions about administration policy get punished by having their access cut off? Will this cause a chilling effect where journalists dare not risk asking any questions that might offend? Is this the kind of America that you want?

(Also posted at Unfair Doctrine)

On Obama's NPR "Socialist Bombshell"

The transcript comes from, and audio is available at, Hot Air:

If you look at the victories and failures of the civil rights movement and its litigation strategy in the court. I think where it succeeded was to invest formal rights in previously dispossessed people, so that now I would have the right to vote. I would now be able to sit at the lunch counter and order as long as I could pay for it I’d be o.k. But, the Supreme Court never ventured into the issues of redistribution of wealth, and of more basic issues such as political and economic justice in society.

To that extent, as radical as I think people try to characterize the Warren Court, it wasn’t that radical. It didn’t break free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution, at least as its been interpreted and Warren Court interpreted in the same way, that generally the Constitution is a charter of negative liberties. Says what the states can’t do to you. Says what the Federal government can’t do to you, but doesn’t say what the Federal government or State government must do on your behalf, and that hasn’t shifted and one of the, I think, tragedies of the civil rights movement was, um, because the civil rights movement became so court focused I think there was a tendency to lose track of the political and community organizing and activities on the ground that are able to put together the actual coalition of powers through which you bring about redistributive change. In some ways we still suffer from that. …

I’m not optimistic about bringing about major redistributive change through the courts. You know, the institution just isn’t structured that way.

OK, so a lot of commentators are calling this a pretty big deal, but I'm not sure that I'm impressed.

There's nothing here that we didn't know about Obama already if we have been paying the least amount of attention.

Here's the problem- if you haven't been paying enough attention (or have been willfully ignorant of the signs up to now), you're not going to be swayed by anything here. This is a typical "early Obama" answer (by early, I mean before about September of this year- with Obama, there's not a whole lot of late). It meanders about and doesn't really say anything at all specific.

There are two things here that ought to scare the pants off of those of us who fear socialism:

1) Obama strongly implies that he thinks that the Supreme Court's role should, or at least acceptably could, include wealth redistribution (as well as "economic justice," whatever that means). This almost certainly means that the justices that he would appoint, if given full reign by a supportive Congress and still moonstruck press, will make Justices Bryer and Ginsberg look like Pat freakin' Robertson. And those justices will be around for decades. But the problem is, he doesn't ever come right out and say that that is what he supports. There's no sound bite that says this that can be used and echoed.

Look, I don't want us to be in a world where you have to have a sound bite, but we are where we are. Particularly for someone who is still impressionable at this point in the game. You have to have something that can be packaged and grabbed onto, and that's just not here.

2) He imples that the Supreme Court should be, or at least acceptably could be, "set up" in a way that would bring "major redistributive change." He doesn't say for sure what that would be, but the surrounding statements strongly imply that a) that change would involve "break[ing] free from the essential constraints that were placed by the founding fathers in the Constitution," and b) that going beyond the constitution would be a good thing (as he stated then that he was "not optimistic" that this would happen- surely he was not envisioning personally appointing justices at the time).

Now, if you already understand that Obama is a socialist, then you didn't have to go through that logical process to get there from here. But, if you already understand Obama is a socialist, you aren't who we need to be talking to right now. The only reason that things like "Joe the Plumber" and "McCain has 7 houses" work is because they are easy to grasp and easy to repeat. This isn't. So it won't help.

Look, the fact of the matter, and I think that this current election shows it, is that most people just don't fear socialism in the form that Obama presents it. We have next to no economic education, and there is little to no understanding that redistribution has to come from somewhere. I have spoken to a number of people that I would have called well educated and informed and am shocked to find out how little they know about the Constitution- even fellow law students want judges that will do what is "right" or "fair" (of course, always in the their estimation), rather than what the Constitution says (and almost as many of them are on my side of the political spectrum as not, I'm sorry to report).

I wish it were different. I'll try to raise my kids to think differently, and I'll try to spread the word through this blog and my general discussions, but the fact of the matter is, most people just won't get it.

Update: Jennifer Rubin and Glenn Reynolds also think that this is no surprise from Obama

Student Suspended for Anti-Obama T-Shirt

Michael P. Stafford, Esq., at The Delaware Employment Law Blog, has an interesting story about a 5th grader who had the audacity to wear a tee-shirt to school with the slogan “Obama is a terrorist’s best friend.”

The free-speech rights of a student is the topic of the day in Colorado, where a 5th grader has been suspended for wearing a tee-shirt emblazoned with the slogan “Obama is a terrorist’s best friend.” The student’s family claims that his First Amendment right to free speech is being trampled. Conspicuously absent from news coverage of this developing story is any detailed description of the tee-shirt causing “substantial disruption” to the school.

Did the school administration make the correct decision in suspending this youngster?
Under well-established Supreme Court precedent, public school administrators may regulate student speech protected by the First Amendment only in three circumstances: (1) when the speech is substantially disruptive; (2) when the speech bears the imprimatur of the school (such as in a school newspaper or yearbook), or; (3) when the speech is lewd or plainly offensive. In particular, under Tinker v. Des Moines, 393 U.S. 503 (1969), student speech may be regulated only if the school has a well-founded expectation that the speech will cause substantial disruption of the school’s operations or interference with the rights of others. The expectation of disruption must be a specific and significant fear of disruption, not just some remote apprehension of disturbance. In this regard, speech is not disruptive merely because it causes offense or hurt feelings in listeners.

Moreover, any regulation of student speech must also be “content neutral.” In Tinker, which involved students wearing black armbands to school to protest the Vietnam war, the Supreme Court observed that the school had singled out the anti-war black armbands for prohibition but had not forbidden other controversial or political symbols. As many courts have noted in a variety of contexts, restrictions on speech because of its message or content are presumed to be unconstitutional.

I think that Mr. Stafford is just a little bit off on his interpretation here, because he leaves off any discussion of last year’s Moorse v. Frederick (aka, the “bong hits 4 Jesus case”), where the US Supreme Court muddied the waters a little bit on the Tinker test that Stafford cites. (The Court found that the student’s rights were not violated when he was punished for waving a banner on the sidelines of a parade that the students were watching which read “bong hits 4 Jesus”.) However, the Court in Moorse focused overwhelmingly on the school’s “compeling interest” in discouraging illegal drug use, which the majority interpreted this banner as promoting.

Here, I would say that the school might make a similar argument- in fact, it would probably focus on “hate speech” or something similar. However, does the school have a compeling interest in discouraging discussion about the associations of prominant political figures? I think not.

(Also published at Unfair Doctrine)

When I was eight years old . . .

Neil Boortz makes, I think, an exceptionally good point about the argument that Ayres’ activities don’t matter because they happened when Obama was 8 year old:

While we're at it, I'm getting tired of this asinine argument that Ayers threw
his bombs when Obama was only eight-years-old and that this somehow excuses
Obama for any friendship the two may have had. Actually ... this makes the
situation worse. It is not as if a friend of Obama's went off the deep end and
started planting bombs. This man's record was there when Obama found him. It was
not a question of what Ayers might become ... it was the fact of what he already
was, an unrepentant terrorist, when Obama embraced him. An 80-year-old could use
this mindlessly stupid "but I was only eight years old" argument to excuse a
friendship with Hitler today.

Right on. For more, see this (by way of instapundit): "Obama was indeed only eight in early 1970. I was only nine then, the year Ayers’s Weathermen tried to murder me."

Once again, any criticism whatsoever of Obama is racism

According to the AP, by way of Hot Air:

“Our opponent … is someone who sees America, it seems, as being so
imperfect, imperfect enough, that he’s palling around with terrorists who would
target their own country,” Palin told a group of donors in Englewood, Colo. A
deliberate attempt to smear Obama, McCain’s ticket-mate echoed the line at three
separate events Saturday.
“This is not a man who sees America like you and I
see America,” she said. “We see America as a force of good in this world. We see
an America of exceptionalism.”…
Palin’s words avoid repulsing voters with
overt racism. But is there another subtext for creating the false image of a
black presidential nominee “palling around” with terrorists while assuring a
predominantly white audience that he doesn’t see their America?

If you ask me, the McCain camp should try to milk this all they can. The more people see this "If you dare question me, I will label you a racist" sort of politics, the less they will trust Obama.

Why Does Joe Biden Hate the Obama Campaign?

Obama Campaign ad "terrible":

In light of several negative ads put out by both campaigns, CBS’s Katie Couric asked Biden if he is disappointed with the tone of campaign, noting the Obama ad that derides McCain for admitting he doesn’t know how to use a computer.

"I thought that was terrible, by the way," Biden replied.

"Why'd you do it then?” responded Couric.

"I didn't know we did it,” Biden answered, “and if I'd had anything to do with it, we would have never done it.”

At the end of the ad a picture of Biden with Obama is displayed as Obama says “…and I approve this message.” Couric pointed out that – as with every campaign ad – Obama did approve it.

“I don't think anything was intentional about that,” said Biden. “They were trying to make another point.”

Well, it was, but even so, you're not supposed to say that.

Three hours after the interview aired, the Delaware senator tried to walk back the comments in a statement saying he had never seen the ad, that he was merely reacting to reports in the press and he knew there was nothing intentionally personal in it.

Oh, wel that's better, then.

What's the Plan?

William Galston has some strong words for Barack Obama:

I'll get right to the point: You are in danger of squandering an election most of us thought was unlosable. The reason is simple: on the electorate’s most important concern – the economy -- you have no clear message, and John McCain has filled the void with his own.

But just yesterday my liberal friend told me all about Obama's reponse to yesterday's economic problems, a great six point plan for the economy. (He didn't know what the points were, but still, it was great.) So, what are those six points?

So, I googled "obama six point plan economy" I got some notes about a Bush six point plan from 2003, and an article from last March with an Obama six point economic plan. The only recent reference I could find was this:

Obama reiterated a six-point economic plan affecting Wall Street that included more oversight, transparency and streamlining of regulatory agencies, cracking down on market manipulation, and regulating institutions for "what they do, not for what they are."

Sounds pretty standard to me. What's McCain's economic plan? His site says:

John McCain has a comprehensive economic plan that will create millions of good American jobs, ensure our nation's energy security, get the government's budget and spending practices in order, and bring relief to American consumers. Read each of the sections below to learn how the McCain Economic Plan will help bring reform, prosperity and peace to America.

It goes on to outline plans for: workplace flexibility (I'm all for this, but not sure what the government's role in it can be without mandates), lower taxes on gas, government reform, support for small businesses, lowering barriers to trade, simpler taxes, etc. Again, sounds fine enough, but pretty standard.

What does Barack Obama's site say about his economic plan? (Off topic, but the first thing that I notice is that BarackObama.com takes me to a site where I have to register my name and contact information. I search around and low on the screen and very small is the button that allows me to skip this step- annoying. Moreover, his site is fancy and full of pictures of him and Biden bathed in heavenly light, and it is slow!). His plans involve basically what we have heard before- middle class tax cuts, windfall profits taxes, something about a Job and Growth Fund that I can't quite figure out, simplify tax filings, etc. Here's an interesting one: eliminate taxes on seniors making over $50,000/year. I can't quite follow that one- how much do seniors making that little pay in the first place? It can't be much, if anything at all. And even so, I would think that a family w/ kids in that pay range is probably better suited for needing such a tax break. Anyway, it goes on and on (and on and on). I didn't see any mention of a 6 point plan, though.

So, on the whole, I can see what Mr. Galston was saying- thereis no coherent message here. Unlike McCain's site, there is no summary and point by point issue, just pages of information that I can't imagine anybody sitting down and reading just out of curiosity.

More Obama Camp Attempts to Shut Down Dissent

Here. Note that his side was offered the chance to respond, and refused.

What will become of the First Amendment under an Obama Administration?

More on the Pig comment: Is any insult to a woman automatically sexist?

Instapundit did a poll asking whether the Lipstick remark was "a deliberate sexist smear" or "an inadvertent gaffe."

Can I think that Obama was referring to Palin as the pig (the referrence to the old fish later certainly appears to be McCain, after all), without thinking that it's sexist? Does "pig" have a special function as a sexist remark?

If we believe that it was to refer to Palin (and he's not just an idiot for not thinking of the obvious connection with the word lipstick), then I'm going to go with it was just a plain, stupid, insult. That doesn't make it any better in my book- it's juvenile and crude, but not neccessarily sexist.

Hah!

Obama's electorial map