More rabbit ears, etc.
Bensblurb # 558 July 7, 2010
Rabbit ears?
That label “identifies a participant in a baseball game who hears things perhaps too well for his own good. A player who becomes nervous or chokes when opposing players or fans yell at or razz him is said to have "rabbit ears.”--Wikipedia
Speaking of labels, here’s more on our own Rabbit Ears in the White House....Maureen Dowd, the NYT columnist: “[Obama is]thin-skinned. And when you're thin-skinned, you like to control the image. And he doesn't often like the image that the media has of him." Poor baby, he forgets that the mainstream media until lately has fawned on him like he was Lollipop, my Yorkie.
More wetbacks regardless: “In the past two decades, the U.S. Border Patrol’s budget has seen a nine-fold increase, and the number of border patrol agents has grown by a factor of five. Yet, over that same period the number of illegal immigrants in the U.S. has tripled.--Wall Street Journal
The long dismal view. Politico‘s Frank Donatelli writes that President Barack Obama’s Democrats have set out to alter fundamentally the nature of the U.S. political system. The changes they’ve wrought will not be easily undone. Obama has sought to remake America into a social democracy — like Germany or France — with a larger public sector, expanded entitlements, stronger labor unions and a changed political structure. He’s doing quite well so far:
--Size of government. Are we really still a government of limited powers at the federal level? It’s hard to make that case.
--The feds are running auto companies. They fired the General Motors board of directors and forced Chrysler bondholders into a settlement far less attractive than that given the United Auto Workers, strong allies of Obama.
--The Bush administration devised the Troubled Asset Relief Program, but the Obama administration has extended it once already, and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has proposed keeping the $700 billion open as a line of credit to fund expanded government programs.
--Obama’s stimulus plan, combined with his amended 2009 budget and his 2010 and 2011 spending plans, have pushed annual deficits to more than $1 trillion per year.
--Entitlement expansion. Obamacare has passed and is lurking in our federal and states’ budget futures. When the program is fully operational in 2014, federal spending for health care is expected to rise sharply. Many businesses could drop their coverage and force workers into the public “exchanges” created by the legislation. Millions more could be eligible for federal subsidies.
All this adds up to millions more advocates for even more generous benefits and higher federal spending. Democratic politicians should be only too happy to oblige.
A novel rationale...for the McChrystal firing, by Paul R. Hollrah (with a hat tip to Bill Wright):
[The pundits and politicians] were all wrong [about Gen. McChrystal]… dead wrong...they all owe McChrystal and his senior aides an apology for assuming that they are lame-brained numbskulls. The facts of the McChrystal case are not in dispute. General McChrystal and his senior officers allowed a reporter for Rolling Stone Magazine, Michael Hastings , to have almost unprecedented access...In an interview with CNN, Hastings reported that he had a tape recorder in his hand most of the time and that McChrystal was "very aware" that his comments would find their way into print. He said, "McChrystal and his people set no ground rules for their conversations, although they did ask that some parts of their conversations were off the record."...The almost unanimous opinion of the talking heads was that the comments made by McChrystal and his staff were off the cuff and inadvertent. But to believe that is to totally ignore who these men are. General McChrystal and his top officers are...intelligent, thoughtful, highly educated, patriots… graduates of West Point and other fine universities… who are dedicated to duty, honor, and country. To think that such men would be so careless as to speak unflatteringly of Obama, Biden, and other top administration figures, in the presence of a reporter...defies logic… at the very least. To think that men who are trained to be careful and deliberate in everything they do, could do something so careless and so unguarded is simply beyond comprehension. I would argue that McChrystal and his aides knew exactly what they were doing. From the day that he became the handpicked "spear carrier" for Obama's unique brand of warfare… playing at being Commander in Chief while playing to his far left constituency… McChrystal's life had been one of constant frustration. After telling Obama exactly how many troops he needed to carry out his mission, Obama...decided to give him just half the troops he requested. McChrystal could not have been happy about that.The Obama team insisted on new Rules of Engagement designed to reduce collateral damage (civilian casualties). Obama's ROE required that U.S. troops must be able to see the enemy with weapon in hand before they were allowed to return fire...our soldiers and Marines were required to fight with one hand tied behind their backs. McChrystal could not have been happy about that.A strict new interrogation policy, dictated by Attorney General Eric Holder, required that prisoners must be delivered to an Interrogation Center within 24 hours of being captured or be released. A great deal of actionable intelligence was lost as a result and battle-hardened enemy fighters were returned to the field to kill Americans. McChrystal must have found that to be incomprehensible.But the greatest insult...may be a new battlefield medal designed by the Obama team. It is called the Courageous Restraint Medal and is awarded to soldiers and Marines who demonstrate uncommon restraint in combat by not firing their weapons even when they feel threatened by the enemy. Would we be surprised to learn that the preponderance of these medals were awarded posthumously? McChrystal must have found that to be an insanity.
I suggest that, having his best military judgments subjected to the White House political sieve for nearly a year and a half, McChrystal decided that he'd had enough...And...to make the most of a bad situation... They had to make the most of his retirement because it provided a one-time opportunity to show the American people, as well as our enemies and our allies, that the man who claims the title of Commander in Chief of the U.S. military does not command the respect of our men and women in uniform. To make the most of that opportunity they had to choose their messenger very carefully...
--Ben Blankenship
#############
Rabbit ears?
That label “identifies a participant in a baseball game who hears things perhaps too well for his own good. A player who becomes nervous or chokes when opposing players or fans yell at or razz him is said to have "rabbit ears.”--Wikipedia
Speaking of labels, here’s more on our own Rabbit Ears in the White House....Maureen Dowd, the NYT columnist: “[Obama is]thin-skinned. And when you're thin-skinned, you like to control the image. And he doesn't often like the image that the media has of him." Poor baby, he forgets that the mainstream media until lately has fawned on him like he was Lollipop, my Yorkie.
More wetbacks regardless: “In the past two decades, the U.S. Border Patrol’s budget has seen a nine-fold increase, and the number of border patrol agents has grown by a factor of five. Yet, over that same period the number of illegal immigrants in the U.S. has tripled.--Wall Street Journal
The long dismal view. Politico‘s Frank Donatelli writes that President Barack Obama’s Democrats have set out to alter fundamentally the nature of the U.S. political system. The changes they’ve wrought will not be easily undone. Obama has sought to remake America into a social democracy — like Germany or France — with a larger public sector, expanded entitlements, stronger labor unions and a changed political structure. He’s doing quite well so far:
--Size of government. Are we really still a government of limited powers at the federal level? It’s hard to make that case.
--The feds are running auto companies. They fired the General Motors board of directors and forced Chrysler bondholders into a settlement far less attractive than that given the United Auto Workers, strong allies of Obama.
--The Bush administration devised the Troubled Asset Relief Program, but the Obama administration has extended it once already, and Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner has proposed keeping the $700 billion open as a line of credit to fund expanded government programs.
--Obama’s stimulus plan, combined with his amended 2009 budget and his 2010 and 2011 spending plans, have pushed annual deficits to more than $1 trillion per year.
--Entitlement expansion. Obamacare has passed and is lurking in our federal and states’ budget futures. When the program is fully operational in 2014, federal spending for health care is expected to rise sharply. Many businesses could drop their coverage and force workers into the public “exchanges” created by the legislation. Millions more could be eligible for federal subsidies.
All this adds up to millions more advocates for even more generous benefits and higher federal spending. Democratic politicians should be only too happy to oblige.
A novel rationale...for the McChrystal firing, by Paul R. Hollrah (with a hat tip to Bill Wright):
[The pundits and politicians] were all wrong [about Gen. McChrystal]… dead wrong...they all owe McChrystal and his senior aides an apology for assuming that they are lame-brained numbskulls. The facts of the McChrystal case are not in dispute. General McChrystal and his senior officers allowed a reporter for Rolling Stone Magazine, Michael Hastings , to have almost unprecedented access...In an interview with CNN, Hastings reported that he had a tape recorder in his hand most of the time and that McChrystal was "very aware" that his comments would find their way into print. He said, "McChrystal and his people set no ground rules for their conversations, although they did ask that some parts of their conversations were off the record."...The almost unanimous opinion of the talking heads was that the comments made by McChrystal and his staff were off the cuff and inadvertent. But to believe that is to totally ignore who these men are. General McChrystal and his top officers are...intelligent, thoughtful, highly educated, patriots… graduates of West Point and other fine universities… who are dedicated to duty, honor, and country. To think that such men would be so careless as to speak unflatteringly of Obama, Biden, and other top administration figures, in the presence of a reporter...defies logic… at the very least. To think that men who are trained to be careful and deliberate in everything they do, could do something so careless and so unguarded is simply beyond comprehension. I would argue that McChrystal and his aides knew exactly what they were doing. From the day that he became the handpicked "spear carrier" for Obama's unique brand of warfare… playing at being Commander in Chief while playing to his far left constituency… McChrystal's life had been one of constant frustration. After telling Obama exactly how many troops he needed to carry out his mission, Obama...decided to give him just half the troops he requested. McChrystal could not have been happy about that.The Obama team insisted on new Rules of Engagement designed to reduce collateral damage (civilian casualties). Obama's ROE required that U.S. troops must be able to see the enemy with weapon in hand before they were allowed to return fire...our soldiers and Marines were required to fight with one hand tied behind their backs. McChrystal could not have been happy about that.A strict new interrogation policy, dictated by Attorney General Eric Holder, required that prisoners must be delivered to an Interrogation Center within 24 hours of being captured or be released. A great deal of actionable intelligence was lost as a result and battle-hardened enemy fighters were returned to the field to kill Americans. McChrystal must have found that to be incomprehensible.But the greatest insult...may be a new battlefield medal designed by the Obama team. It is called the Courageous Restraint Medal and is awarded to soldiers and Marines who demonstrate uncommon restraint in combat by not firing their weapons even when they feel threatened by the enemy. Would we be surprised to learn that the preponderance of these medals were awarded posthumously? McChrystal must have found that to be an insanity.
I suggest that, having his best military judgments subjected to the White House political sieve for nearly a year and a half, McChrystal decided that he'd had enough...And...to make the most of a bad situation... They had to make the most of his retirement because it provided a one-time opportunity to show the American people, as well as our enemies and our allies, that the man who claims the title of Commander in Chief of the U.S. military does not command the respect of our men and women in uniform. To make the most of that opportunity they had to choose their messenger very carefully...
--Ben Blankenship
#############
posted by Ben Blankenship at
8:03 AM
