THE OTHER SHOE DROPS: Updates To Previous Posts
† Is Obama Already A Lame Duck?: Here’s the lede of The Boston Globe’s article on last night’s healthcare “reform” legislation vote in the House:
President Obama scored a stunning political and legislative victory on health care last night that not only will earn him a place in history books, but promises to establish him as a stronger leader of the Democratic Party after a tumultuous first year.
This, mind you, is supposed to be an objective news article. The Globe continues on in this vein to suggest that when Obama went to bed last night, he wasn’t the lame duck he was when he woke up that morning:
Just two months ago his administration appeared to be struggling. Now, in the face of intense adversity, he is about to achieve a goal that has eluded presidents for decades. …
“Some were saying the bloom was really off the rose,’’ said Roger Wilkins, a historian and author who served as an assistant attorney general in the Johnson administration. “There’s a ‘Bambi’ quality to him. When you look at him, there’s this lithe young man who likes to play backyard basketball.
“I think that everybody who thought that Bambi had moved into the White House knows that’s not true today.’’ Wilkins continued. “He is one tough fellow, and he has proved himself to be pretty good at politics as well.’’ …
The win boosts Obama’s standing with his liberal base, which had grown increasingly frustrated over the president’s inability to push through their wish-list, including health care overhaul, a climate change bill, and the closure of the prison at Guantanamo Bay. A reinvigorated Democratic party - although still facing likely losses in November’s mid-term elections - is now better positioned to galvanize support for the rest of Obama’s domestic agenda, including legislation aimed at job expansion, energy, financial regulation, and immigration.
Yes, and the rest of Obama’s overreaching domestic agenda items is not only at least as polarizing as healthcare “reform” but threatens to push up the national debt to unsustainable levels, and thus, pushing down employment opportunities for the victims of the “he-cession” to unbearable levels. In a Los Angeles Times op-ed David Paul Kuhn of RealClearPolitics makes the case for “a GOP landslide on a scale not seen since 1994” because white men who supported Obama the 2008 election instead of his Republican opponent, John McCain, “are walking away from the Democratic Party”:
It looked for a moment as though Democrats had finally reached the men of Bruce Springsteen's music, bringing them around to the progressive values Springsteen himself has long endorsed. But liberal analysts failed to understand that these new Democrats were still firmly rooted in American moderation. …
Obama's brand of liberalism is exactly the sort likely to drive such voters away. More like LBJ's than FDR's, Obama-style liberalism favors benefits over relief, a safety net over direct job programs, healthcare and environmental reform over financial reform and a stimulus package that has focused more on social service jobs - healthcare work, teaching and the like - rather than the areas where a majority of job losses occurred: construction, manufacturing and related sectors. …
Think about the average working man. He has already witnessed financial bailouts for the rich folks above him. Now he sees a healthcare bailout for the poor folks below him. Big government represents lots of costs and little gain.
It’s not just blue-collar white men. Obama hasn’t done right by private sector white collar workers, either.
† Living In These Mad, Mad, Madoff Times: That “WOO HOO!” you just heard was Homer Simpson’s reaction to finding out that the San Jose Mercury News has replaced “Cathy” with a new, “ultra-topical” strip, “Dustin” in its Sunday comics pages:
For most of us, the recession has been a nightmare. But for cartoonists Steve Kelley and Jeff Parker, it's been a stroke of good luck.
When they first began bouncing around ideas for "Dustin," a comic strip that spins around a jobless 23-year-old who lives above his parents' garage, the economy hadn't yet hit the skids.
"Who could have known this would happen?" says Parker, 50. "These days the statistics on young people moving back in with their folks is staggering. That never happened when I was kid [sic]."
Suddenly Dustin became the it-boy of the comics page. An antihero for the recession age, he's a "boomerang" kid content to mooch off his parents while he flits from one temp gig to another and dreams of making it big, as a stand-up comic or a pro golfer (you know, whichever happens first).
The Stiletto is looking forward to “ultra-topical” strips about Dustin staying on his parents’ health insurance plan for another three years.
† Updates To Previous Posts (fifth item, Always Remember And Don’t Ever Forget): Contradicting the State Department’s initial position, Assistant Secretary of State Philip Gordon says the agency will not block the House from voting on the Armenian Genocide Resolution, which cleared the Foreign Affairs Committee two weeks ago, reports The Associated Press: "Congress is an independent body, and they are going to do what they decide to do," Gordon. … Gordon acknowledged the congressional committee vote had set back relations at a time when the United States is seeking help from Turkey to rein in Iran's nuclear ambitions. But he said the United States has not seen a deterioration in cooperation with Turkey on a wide range of foreign policy matters. The Obama administration has urged lawmakers to keep the measure from a vote in the full House. It is not clear whether supporters of the resolution have enough support to bring it to the House floor. "I recognize that we have a tough job ahead of us to garner the necessary support," said the resolution's chief sponsor, California Democratic Rep. Adam Schiff. Ironically, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan may have made it easier for Schiff to line up support for the symbolic resolution. Turkish newspaper Hürriyet Daily News reports that should the House pass the resolution, Erdogan threatened to finish the job his Ottoman forebears started to rid Turkey of as many Armenians as he could: "There are 170,000 Armenians in my country. Of these, 70,000 are citizens, but we are tolerating the remaining 100,000... If necessary, I may have to tell them to go back to their country... I am not obliged to keep them here," he charged. The exact number of illegal Armenians in Turkey are unknown, but researchers say there are between 10,000 to 20,000 of them, adding that Turkish authorities tend to inflate the figures to put pressure on Armenia. Leaving aside the fact that since antiquity “their” country has included Mt. Ararat, Van and other regions that Turkey now controls, Erdogan reassured the 70,000 Armenian citizens of Turkey that he did not mean to suggest another forced deportation but flatly rejected calls to apologize to them. † Updates To Previous Posts (seventh item, How ACORN Got Buried By “Squirrelly Right-Wingers”): ACORN is teetering on the verge of bankruptcy, after suffering “a severe loss of government and other funds,” reports The New York Times: Over the last six months, at least 15 of the group’s 30 state chapters have disbanded and have no plans of re-forming, Acorn officials said. The California and New York chapters, two of the largest, have severed their ties to the national group and have independently reconstituted themselves with new names. Several other state groups are also re-forming outside the Acorn umbrella, and will not be affected if the national organization files for bankruptcy. This week, the Maryland chapter announced that it would not reopen its offices, which were shuttered in September in the wake of a widely publicized series of video recordings made by two conservative activists, posing as a prostitute and a pimp, who secretly filmed Acorn workers providing them tax advice. … After the activists’ videos came to light and swiftly became fodder for 24-hour cable news coverage, private donations from foundations to Acorn all but evaporated and the federal government quickly distanced itself from the group. … [L]ong before the activist videos delivered what may become the final blow, the organization was dogged for years by financial problems and accusations of fraud. In the summer of 2008, infighting erupted over embezzlement of Acorn funds by the brother of the organization’s founder. Meanwhile, the Obama administration’s left hand - OMB Director Peter Orszag – is tying its other left hand – Attorney General Eric Holder – behind its back. The Justice Department is appealing a ruling by the United States District Court for the Eastern District of New York and asking for a stay barring enforcement of a Congressional ban on ACORN funding. But Orszag sent a memo to the Departments of Housing and Urban Development, Treasury, Commerce, and Defense, and the Environmental Protection Agency ordering them to comply with the ruling by re-opening the federal funding spigot. Editorial Note: In addition to acknowledging his paper was slow to take notice of the pimp-and-ho sting, New York Times ombudsman Cark Hoyt concedes his paper’s coverage of the scandal was wrong on one minor point – that “James O’Keefe … was in the ‘gaudy guise’ of a pimp when he accompanied Hannah Giles, dressed as a streetwalker” - but shreds the contention of ACORN supporters that “the whole story will fall apart over the issue of what O’Keefe wore” because “if that was wrong, everything else must be wrong”: The record does not support them. If O’Keefe did not dress as a pimp, he clearly presented himself as one: a fellow trying to set up a woman - sometimes along with under-age girls - in a house where they would work as prostitutes. In Washington, he said the prostitution was to finance his future in politics. A worker for Acorn Housing, an allied group, warned him to stay away from the brothel lest someone “get wind that you got a house and that your girlfriend is over there running a house of women of the night. You will not have a career.” FAIR said that in Brooklyn, O’Keefe and Giles seemed to be telling Acorn staffers that “they are attempting to buy a house to protect child prostitutes from an abusive pimp.” That’s right, but FAIR left out the part about their clear intention to operate a brothel, which the Acorn workers seemed to take in stride, with one warning: “Don’t get caught, ’cause it is against the law.” The videos were heavily edited. The sequence of some conversations was changed. Some workers seemed concerned for Giles, one advising her to get legal help. In two cities, Acorn workers called the police. But the most damning words match the transcripts and the audio, and do not seem out of context. † Updates To Previous Posts (last item, Some Questions Are Best Not Asked): UCLA School of Law professor Richard Sander's four year attempt to obtain California State Bar historical data on bar exams to further his research into whether affirmative action gave minority students access to elite law schools for which they weren't academically prepared was dealt another blow by San Francisco Superior Court Judge Curtis Karnow, reports The Recorder: "None of the data at issue is presented to a court and none ever is used in any form of adjudicatory proceeding," he wrote in Sander v. The State Bar of California, 508880, "even within the confines of the State Bar with respect, for example, to how any applicant is processed. "That is," he added, "even were I to expand the notion of 'adjudication' to reach the work of the State Bar in evaluating its applicants, the data sought by Sander would not qualify." … The State Bar has repeatedly rejected Sander's requests, saying the information he wants is confidential and was collected with the understanding it wouldn't be released to third parties. In his tentative ruling, Karnow also refuted Sander's arguments that Proposition 59 - passed by the voters in 2004 to make access to public records a civil right under the state Constitution - applied to every court document. … The judge, however, left one issue up in the air - whether data in electronic records, "which must be massaged to some extent for production," become "new" records that are disclosable. Without expert declarations, Karnow held, the issue "is likely not ripe for adjudication." † Updates To Previous Posts (second item, Putting The “Boo” In Boomer): In an Adweek op-ed Marketer William Higham, who forecasts consumer trends, contends that the generations have flip-flopped, with teens and 20-somethings cautious and responsible while their elders are adopting reckless and dangerous behaviors: For today's teenagers, it's less about breaking down barriers than retreating behind them. Anxiety levels are rising among the young, thanks perhaps to a mix of political events and "paranoid parenting." … This is driving a trend for more conservative behaviors. … According to government figures, recent youth rates for illicit drugs have "declined significantly," falling 25 percent in the last six years. Drinking and smoking rates are also down. Today's conserva-teens are also more concerned about their financial future - an attitude accelerated by recent economic events. In a recent BBDO survey, U.S. teens chose financial security as their No. 1 life goal. … [I]nstead of retiring with pipe and slippers to listen to the classics, many of the new old are still pursuing the sex, drugs and rock 'n' roll lifestyle of their youth. … Meanwhile, the rate of 50-somethings' illicit drug use rose more than 70 percent during 2002-08; marijuana is now more prevalent with them than with any other age group. Four million Americans age 50 or older are estimated to have used at least one drug illicitly in the past year, according to the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's "National Survey on Drug Use and Health, 2009." … Obviously not every teenager or boomer conforms to these new typologies. But statistics suggest more and more do. It's time to start targeting the conserva-teen and the new old. † Updates To Previous Posts (last item, 10 Reasons Michelle Obama Should Be Proud – Really Proud – Of America): This latest installment in The Stiletto Blog’s ongoing series meant to help instill the necessary pride of country in Michelle Obama’s consciousness to enable her to serve as an unofficial ambassador focuses on Reed Sandridge, 28, who started a “year of giving” since being laid off from his job last autumn. The Washington Post reports that Sandridge has been giving away $10 to a stranger every day, “documenting each $10 gift in a small black notebook and then blogging about the people he meets”: He's been using his savings and a few hundred a week in unemployment benefits to pay the mortgage on his home in Dupont Circle. But he hopes he will network his way to a salary again long before he runs out of cash. … But the year of giving is not about the money. Sandridge is trying to spread an idea. Doing nice things all the time is addictive, he said. … He wanders the city looking for strangers who appear as if they might need help or have an interesting story to tell. He has a few rules: He gives only $10, and he doesn't take anything in exchange. … Every once in a while, he knows the money really helps someone. It pays for a meal or turns someone's lousy day into one that feels lucky. On his fifth day, in the middle of a fierce snowstorm, he met Davie McInally, a Scottish man with icicles frozen in his thick beard who was carrying his belongings in a backpack and trying to get to New York to enlist in the military. McInally hoped to serve on active duty and earn his citizenship, and the $10, added to his $14, made a bus ticket possible. … On his Web site, Sandridge keeps a list of ideas for helping those he has met: Ron, who has experience with heavy machinery, wants day-labor work. Nikki needs help with filing disability claims. Garland, a street drummer, wants gigs. Anthony needs a pair of size 9 sneakers. Sometimes, someone following the blog, another stranger, will step in to help.
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