While We Wait For The Next Pretty Speech On One Debacle Or Another

Obama in inaction. More from Paul Roy and Jennifer Rubin.

Comments

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

I do give Obummer credit for one thing... he's certainly taken his personal humiliation over Syria out of the headlines with the ObummerCare debacle. Wait...

[Danube on iPad]

Forty-four percent of Americans say he's doing a good job. Heaven help us.

[Captain Hate on the iPhone]

What? No Bret Stephens?

[Jeff Dobbs]

First link is to Bret Stephens.

[Captain Hate on the iPhone]

Oops.

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

I usually like Bret Stephens.

[Jane]

Hey! Paul Roy was the first person who joined me to start the Sturbridge Tea Party. Good job Paul!

[MarkO]

He knew about all of them and he's lying.

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

MarkO-- never infer that Obummer 'knew' anything:.... he's just not that....

[MarkO]

Oh, goody. He's pissed off the spooks.

http://www.latimes.com/world/la-fg-spying-phones-20131029,0,3235295.story#axzz2j7j1TiGs

[DrJ]

Oh this is just wonderful [/sac off]

With climate-change legislation stymied at the federal level, a coalition of West Coast states and one Canadian province on Monday signed a regional pact to rein in greenhouse gas emissions and fight global warming.

The governors of California, Oregon and Washington, along with the premier of British Columbia, agreed to put a price on carbon dioxide emissions across an area that includes 53 million people.

[henry]

DrJ, Perhaps some fly-over states and provinces should sign a pipeline pact.

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

[email protected]:07-- I love you buddy, always thinking.

PS: does not look good for the Cards.

[henry]

NK, we got them right where we want them... Wacha then game 7 (always a toss-up). Ask Rangers fans how confident Sox fans should be at this point. BTW Papi is on fire!

[jimmyk]

Oh, goody. He's pissed off the spooks.

Spooks?

Sorry, Roth's "The Human Stain" comes to mind when I see "spooks." Roth's open letter in the link notes that it's based on a true story, and also has the humorous aside that Wikipedia told Roth that he was not an authority on his book when he tried to correct the entry.

Roth, despite being a lefty, is willing to skewer lefty sacred cows (kind of like Larry David).

/end{pretentious literary allusion}

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

Henry-- best of luck with it. Ortiz? Even Barry Bonds was never this locked in making contact-- the last player I can remember being this impossible to get out was the run Jack Clark went on when teams just refused to pitch to him.

[Jane]

"BTW Papi is on fire!"

Ya gotta love his attitude.

[MarkO]

Ortiz is like Obama in that he didn't know he was taking steroids.

Does he look like he stopped?

[[email protected]]

***
Forty-four percent of Americans say he's doing a good job. Heaven help us.

Posted by: Danube on iPad***

And that won't go much lower. rse has written why.

Humm, that pact, how is it constitutional. Exam Thursday! Yeah.

[Neo]

I bet this is the topic of the next "pretty speech"

After Friday, states will lose $5 billion in food aid

The American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 provided a 13.6 percent funding increase to SNAP recipients beginning in April 2009, money the bill’s backers said would make its way quickly into the economy. But that extra funding ends Nov. 1. Every one of the 48 million SNAP recipients will see their benefits cut in their next checks.

... but they had to have the clean CR ... without the SNAP money

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

SNAP-- when Obummer comes out and demands $5B continued for SNAP-- that will go over well with TP-voters. How about delaying the Medicaid expansionsion until we 'fix' ObummerCare-- how about we audit all Soc Sec disability recipients. Doing those things cuts FY 14 borrowing by $50+B. Keep the sequester going, and we are starting on the road to sanity. What do these people do? Nix ObummerCare altogether and they'll be able to get a job. What's that Obummer refuses to do any of this? Let's have an election in Nov.

[narciso]

A nationwide Uverse outage has kept me in the Phantom zone. It's remarkable how the Times has gone fully Malabar, as has Mcclatchy

[maryrose]

Barry doesn't get money for anything because he had his chance to negotiate and refused. He owns all of this including the sequester and letting this SNAP provision expire without making some deal with repubs before the deadline. He is operating 24/7 in crisis mode and I for one am sick of it and him. Impeach the day after the 2014 midterms.

[[email protected]]

***Every one of the 48 million SNAP recipients will see their benefits cut in their next checks.***

so the SNAP Walmart riots were just the warm up act...or wet test. those fatties need to slim down anyway.

Just great.

[matt]

local talk shows are raging on Obama this mornings, but then their audience is primarily angry while males. I think this one's gonna percolate into the gray matter of the LIV's slowly but surely as they realize they've been had.

The reductions in emergency welfare programs will be another inflection point as the era of free shit begins to close down.

In NY State, doctors are completely confused by O'Care even though this is one of the few states where premiums will drop. Obama has managed to flummox the entire country.

Notice that he is, like Oz, hiding behind the curtain the whole time. I'm sure his visit to Church was more photo op than come to Jesus. The only way to view him is through the prism of his constant campaigning.

[[email protected]]

and reading my joke it fell flat. sorry.

[rse]

matt-

You know how I have been following certain people since hearing their troubling ideas at the (co)lab summit and pondering the implications?

Well, today's newsletter came complete with Ecuador's 5 Year plan to Good Living.

The era of free shit may be over but these planners are doubling down. I haven't read so much illiteracy about how economies and societies can work since Julius Nyerere was speculating about avoiding a middle class post-colonialism.

It has been bothering me for a while why I keep hearing of looking to South America as a model. You just want to ask if anyone took anything other than theory classes in getting their degrees.

OL-Red says not broken. AND now she understands insurance much better.

[Dave (in MA)]

Papi's slimmed down from previous years, and he really charges to 1B instead of admiring his hits like he used to.

OT, In the sidebar when I go to FB:

Entertainment Pages You May Like

The Rachel Maddow Show
1,053,086 people like this.
Like

I think some algorithms need refinement.

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

South Africa-- I completely understand why that is a model for collectivists. Everyone in the RSA is an economic loser post-Apartheid-- except for the collectivist bureaucrats. Hardest hit? the Black middle class that was forming as Apartheid was winding down.

[Account Deleted]

Dave (in MA),

It appears that a determination is being made that Fecesbook itself is full of obama.

Just a sec - I lost my shocked face for a moment.

[narciso]

Ecuador is an interesting example, not as obvious asVenezuela, or Argentina

[matt]

South America is to a large extent crashing and burning right now.Brazil is being hit with a hard dose of reality as the Real has been overvalued and they are fighting currency wars with the USA, China, and EU. The whole Olympic/World Cup program is really sketchy as well.

Argentina is deep in their own mire. Venezuela's Maduro is seeming more and more like the dictator on Woody Allen's "Bananas" and is running out of cash. Evo Morales is becoming the poster boy for Islamic radicalism and narco state status. To call it, any real progress in South America has been lost in the past 10 years except for perhaps Chile.

[Captain Hate on the iPhone]

Ortiz is a good example of you can take PEDs and if you subsequently are a nice person, ie don't act like Bonds or Clemens, people will forgive you.

[narciso]

It makes sense, rse if critical race theory is your template, which is derivative dependency theory

[narciso]

Lhota is really working on more selective isnt he

[jimmyk]

South America is to a large extent crashing and burning right now.

I always thought the optimism about Brazil was wishful thinking, plus leftover belief in "third way" economics that never worked (at least not without a large oil reserves). The same for the rest of the BRICs, though India might have a slim chance of getting over the hump.

[rse]

matt & jimmy-

I agree except the crashing and burning simply increases pressure on the UN and the OECD to force the US and others to cough up the long sought funds to close the gap among countries.

As I have written I have tracked it through the world order modelling of the 70s and that Bariloche model that was originally developed in Argentina and finished in Brazil, through the Balaton Group, through Sustainability, and now this Great Transition that the UN, OECD, and unfortunately the US and UK are implementing through the Belmont Challenge.

And making the mayors the kingmakers in this vision just brings in a group that is equally as clueless as the state or federal legislators and even happier that their election brings foreign travel.

I also wrote a few months ago about riots in Brazil indicating that plenty of people take the rhetoric about equality seriously to demand someone make the world work like the expectations that have been cultivated.

[Frau Caligari]

"...so the SNAP Walmart riots

Legal looting is now enshrined in the Zombie Constitution, rich, pursuit of happiness, etc., etc.

[Thomas Collins]

http://www.theimaginativeconservative.org/2013/10/howard-zinn-historiography.html

See the above link for an interesting summary of the possible influence of Howard Zinn's "history" of the US and thoughts on what a real people's history of the US might contain.

I know, this is a shameless attempt to get a family member intertube hits. However, as I am confident my kids will all confirm, if they don't write something worth reading, I wouldn't link it.

[Jim Eagle]

Brazil is the country of the future and always will be.

Keith Alexander is doing a monologue in front of the House Intelligence Committee. No notes. Verbatim. Pretty good testimony and he is spot on. But the committee is going to recess to vote in the House. Protestors in the room asking questions and Mike Rogers is having them removed. Code Pink (natch).

[sbwaters]

TC - Excellent.

Tell him, "Louder!"

[Thomas Collins]

Thanks, sbw. I'll pass your exhortation along to him.

[Jim Eagle]

TC & sbw,

I will be getting my copy of "Rush Revere" today. Lets pray that he overtakes commie Howard and reinserts truth in our exceptional history. Every night it is Frederick's chore to read a chapter. I am buying extra volumes for the social studies teacher and the library at school.

[Account Deleted]

TC,

I found Gregory's piece on Locke to be superior to his examination of Zinn's influence. The angle from which he approaches Locke is rather refreshing, although he may not be giving sufficient weight to the slippery nature of Locke's shifting custom when contrasted with the glacial nature of change as envisioned by Burke and Kirk.

[dublindave]

Dublindave is like an anchor to reality in times of right-wing-christo-monrachist fever.

I have returned from my two week holiday in Giverney-thank you to the shipman family for putting me up and putting up with me.

Healthcare.gov wil get fixed-no the pREZ did not lie about keeping your plan you just getting a better one.

Now let's get back to reality.

[Danube on iPad]

Re state compacts: see Constitution, Article 1, Section 10, Clause 3.

[Danube on iPad]

I seem to recall that SCt. decisions have all but written the "without congressional approval" provision out of the law, but I'm not sure.

[henry]

DoT, agreed. The Constitution is a response to the Articles of Confederation which did not constrain the states on foreign mischief. My suggestion was a bit of "sauce for the goose & etc." as a reminder to the left coast governors.

[Thomas Collins]

Rick, I'm glad that Gregory was willing to wade into the area of the impact of the thought of Enlightenment thinkers on a conservative social order. I have tended to view Locke's thought as more problematical to such an order than is expressed in Gregory's essay on Locke, but it's a worthwhile discussion.

I believe there was a Notre Dame professor who a year or two ago presented a view of Locke significantly at odds with Gregory's essay on Locke. I'll try to find it.

[Laura]

TC,
Great site and just what I was looking for on Locke, who seems to be all things to all manner of ideologues. If you are a hard over rad trad he's an absolute empiricist, if you lean all the way to the left he's a troglodyte protestant Thomist who put his faith in God, if you are Austrian you simply declare his belief in the divine to be a cover during religious intolerance,he really was an atheist. If you are somewhat to the left you hang on to his social contract and ignore the natural law,and if like us you believe he grasped the necessity of finding a civil framework that both protected and liberated. Because no matter how imperfect and flawed it's the best we've come up with.

[Danube on iPad]

"Historically, this clause generally meant all compacts must receive congressional consent. However, it has been found in a number of instances, notably the 1893 US Supreme Court case Virginia v. Tennessee that not all compacts require congressional consent. It is well established today that only those compacts that affect a power delegated to the federal government or alter the political balance within the federal system, require the consent of Congress."

[Captain Hate on the iPhone]

Mark Levin spent most of the first hour of his Friday show explaining how the Constitution has its roots in the Enlightenment.

[Old Lurker]

You know I still have all those books from my courses in the sixties, still on one shelf in my study. I sure wish I knew then what I know now as I dozed through so many of those classes. Truthfully it was not until I took an economics course based on Milton Friedman's books in my senior year in college that the light bulb went on. I see next year's summer reading list taking shape already.

[jimmyk]

Don't know where we are in the threads, but it's fun to watch Josh Barro (Robert's illegitimate son) get skewered all over Twitter:

http://twitchy.com/2013/10/29/elitist-primal-scream-josh-barro-declares-that-father-government-knows-best/

[Old Lurker]

From Drudge:

"Each U.S. taxpayer now has a federal-debt liability of $1.1 million, and rising.
Remember that when President Obama boasts that the federal deficit—the shortfall between annual revenues and spending—is declining. Of course, the primary reason for the decline is the sequester, which was his idea but now adamantly opposes.
The public tends to focus on the total national debt, which just passed the $17 trillion mark—up from $10.6 trillion when President Obama took office. But that figure pales in comparison to the federal government’s long term unfunded liabilities—money the government is obligated to pay over and above the revenues it is estimated to receive.
According to the U.S. Debt Clock, total long term unfunded liabilities are at $126 trillion, a $1.1 million liability for each U.S. taxpayer.
The main driver of that astronomical number is two of our major entitlement programs: Social Security and Medicare.
The Debt Clock says Social Security is looking at $16.6 trillion in unfunded liabilities, while Medicare faces $87.6 trillion. And Medicare’s prescription drug benefit, which passed in 2003, adds another $22 trillion.
- See more at: http://rare.us/story/your-share-of-the-national-debt-is-now-1-1-million/#sthash.Ds9shgEK.dpuf

[Laura]

TC,
Thank you for posting the site. You must be very proud of your son; his writing is very lucid.

Locke is a conundrum. I've only just been truly exposed to the Catholic critique of Locke and the enlightenment and as such keep finding myself defending his positions, but really many of his underlying assumptions and philosophy are not completely thought and/or are contradictory.
Gregory does a nice job presenting a synthesis of Locke's positions and conservatism, though perhaps a little too sanquine.
The Enlightenment stumbled into a sweet spot with Locke and lucked into Burke and the American founders, everything else turned into DOOM.

[Old Lurker]

Bad as those numbers are, they are even badder than they appear.

1. I suspect they do not adequately reflect what "comprehensive immigration reform" is going to add to out year expenditures and promises.

2. Even $1,100,000 per individual is misleading if we persist in paying for the government with taxes from but half the population, and if that half is even more skewed to the top 20%.

3. So unless something changes, it looks to me like my family of four will be expected to pay maybe $15,000,000 over the span of my life and my kids' lives.

4. Then there is inflation that will make all those numbers look funny as time goes on.

Ready to run and hide yet?

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

[email protected]:35-- well thanks for cheering me up!
Even though I have knowledge about all that, seeing the numbers is still jarring. Our debt is a sick joke... in one form or another Default will come. And that Bastard Krugman puts his name to stories saying the Debt is 'meaningless'. Sick man.

[Stephanie]

It IS meaningless if you don't expect to have to pay for it. Kinda like those folks who were all for universal healthcare til they actually got a bill. Abstracts are fun, reality not so much.

[Old Lurker]

Steph, the mistake they always make is to assume that people like me are both clever enough to accumulate the $16,000,000 they want for my share of the debt and at the same time we are stupid enough to let them have it?

Ain't gonna happen.

Which of course makes that bubble even more explosive.

[Account Deleted]

"many of his underlying assumptions and philosophy are not completely thought and/or are contradictory"

Laura,

That's why Madison gave Montesqieu's Spirit of the Law considerably more weight than Locke's treatises while writing the Constitution. Locke is revered more for Jefferson's bastardization of his "life, liberty and property" into "life, liberty and the pursuit of whatever" than for his actual influence on Madison. Madison recognized the limits of empirical reasoning and the more than slight possibility it could lead to Rainbow Unicorn irreality when misapplied with sufficient "popular consensus".

[narciso]

Well Locke is an imperfect template, 'except for all the others' as for alternate perspectives I think Larry Schweickart ,s take is pretty good.

[Aretha]

Je comptais justement faire un petit poste semblaable à
celui ci

[Old Lurker]

Here they go:

AP "WASHINGTON (AP) — The Senate voted along party lines Tuesday to reject a GOP effort that would have blocked the approved increase in the national debt limit.

The chamber voted 54-45 against the GOP move to try to use a special "disapproval" process to block that increase.

The move came as Senate Democrats proposed to avoid future showdowns over the so-called debt ceiling by giving the president authority to authorize additional federal borrowing unless Congress can muster veto-proof margins to block him.

The move by Sens. Charles Schumer, D-N.Y., Barbara Boxer, D-Calif., and Mazie Hirono, D-Hawaii, is aimed at heading off future Washington confrontations over increasing the government's borrowing cap. Debt limit battles this fall and in 2011 spooked financial markets and took the government precariously close to a default on its obligations.

"It's time for us to put in place a straightforward process to avoid a catastrophic default on our nation's debt," Boxer said, adding that the legislation "sends a strong message of certainty to the markets, to our families and to the world."

The Democratic legislation is based on a proposal first unveiled by GOP Leader Mitch McConnell of Kentucky during the 2011 debt limit battle. But McConnell weighed in against the Democratic plan even before it was unveiled, saying debt increases must be paired with spending cuts or other reforms.

The recently-passed debt limit measure included the mechanism under which the president proposes a debt increase that takes effect automatically unless Congress approves legislation to overturn the move. He could veto that legislation, however.

"Increases in the debt ceiling should be accompanied by reforms," McConnell said. "That's just what we did in 2011, when Congress raised the debt ceiling in return for enacting $2 trillion in bipartisan spending control."

McConnell is positioned to filibuster the measure if Democrats try to force a vote and the measure is a non-starter with the GOP-controlled House.

[NK(tryin'2.0)]

OL-- thanks for that link. The Debt is the Dems achilles heel. They must have it, they are addicted it to it now, just like the spending it goes for. If they push taxes they will lose the Senate, so Debt it is. I know I'm repeating myself but, the Debt should be the focus of all conservatives and Repubs b/c the winning % of voters hate the Debt. The trick for conservatives to use this to win elections, is to prove that we are attacking the Debt to save everyone, not just to feed fat cats. It can be done, it must be done.

[narciso]

McConnell is really helpful, kind of like jar jar binks

[Old Lurker]

You know, even if you have not been to church ever/in years, how can you consider it moral to spend money on yourself then expect your children & grandchildren to pay for it, even if those same children starve themselves because of it?

Has any civilization ever survived with that value system? Anyone? Bueller?

[Jane-Rebel Alliance1]

Go Gregory!

[Laura]

On to Montesqieu

[Porchlight]

Brazil is the country of the future and always will be.

Good line, JiB. I don't know though, I think they're going to be a big PITA eventually.

[rse]

Laura,

You might start with Paul Rahe's book Soft Despotism, Democracy's Drift.

The subtitle is Montesquieu, Rousseau, Tocqueville, and the Modern Prospect.

Ol-in the summers the tourists would pipe up with "What are you reading?" when they saw me on the boardwalk in the evening with a glass of wine. My neighbors knew I read a great deal of history.

"Oh, I have long been curious about the Reformation and the 30 Years War."

[sbwaters]

Laura, pick and choose with Burke and ignore Rousseau entirely. Spend the extra time with Montesquieu.

[Account Deleted]

SBW,

I feel Rousseau should be read immediately after completing Locke's treatises in order to comprehend where "reason" alone can lead. It's also not a bad idea to have Rousseau's complete idiocy on tap when reading Montesquieu's observations concerning savages and Mhaometans, but I repeat myself.

[sbwaters]

Fair point Rick. One needs to be able to recognize poison to avoid taking it.

[dublindave]

"I know I'm repeating myself but, the Debt should be the focus of all conservatives.."

As it was when Reagan increased it,when Bush one increased it and when Bush 2 increased it.

I'm going to let you in on a nasty little secret that's going to blow your mind.... Republicans don't want to decrease the debt, they only say they do when Democrats are in charge. You see how that works? Debt reduction is how Republicans hobble Democrats political agenda.

Silly boy.

[dublindave]

Ha ha that shut NK up about the debt. Run away and hide little man...not one single Republican President in the last 80 years has reduced the national debt by a friggin dime...yet every single Democratic President has........this is why people can't vote for Conservatism, it's built upon a lie...

Democrats reduce the debt,Republicans increase it.

[poppa india]

Dave, you're confusing Conservatives and Republicans. They are not always the same people. There are many Conservatives who disagree with the Republican Party as much as you do, though with a different view in mind.

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JustOneMinute: While We Wait For The Next Pretty Speech On One Debacle Or Another

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