One word: re-election. I know it sounds ridiculous and unbelievable to some, but President Obama does not want the Democrats to retain the House or Senate this November. It all comes down to his bid for re-election in 2012. Quite simply: Obama wants to run against a Republican Congress in 2012. He needs to be able to point at someone else and blame them for his shortcomings as a leader. Right now, he can’t do that. If he points across the street to Capitol Hill he’s pointing directly at his Democratic brethren in the House and Senate. Think about Bill Clinton in 1996, he had Republican Speaker of the House Newt Gingrich to demonize. Obama needs an enemy–although he’s still trying…
Archive for the ‘Current Events’ Category
The Passing of Two Yankees Legends
A terrific piece from the NRO’s Daniel Foster on the passing of George Steinbrenner and Bob Sheppard, the legendary voice of the New York Yankees from 1951 – 2007.
It has been a tough week for the Yankee faithful. First, legendary Stadium announcer Bob “the Voice of God” Sheppard passed over the weekend (I’ll always remember his wonderful palindromes: ”Now batting, numbah 2, the shortstop, Derek Jee-tuh, the shortstop, numbah 2, now batting.”). And now the news that The Boss, George Steinbrenner, has died at age 80.
That’s exactly how Sheppard used to introduce the players. Here’s a great tribute. I went to my first Yankee game in 1989. I can’t say that I remember his voice that very first game;…
Steele’s Failed Critique Highlights Division Among Conservatives on War Strategy
In 2006, I was really pulling for Michael Steele in his battle to win a U.S. Senate seat in Maryland. Unfortunately, Ben Cardin won and Steele wound up running the Republican National Committee. Steele’s odd remarks about the war in Afghanistan have led to a growing number of calls for his resignation among prominent conservatives. The war in Afghanistan was definitely not a war of President Barack Obama’s choosing, as Steele suggested in his remarks at a Connecticut fundraiser. This factual inaccuracy made the rest of Steele’s comments seem off-the-wall, but it appears as though he was trying to challenge the president’s strategy for prosecuting the war. He just failed miserably:
Well if he’s such a…
Don’t Be Facebook Friends with a Spy
It appears as though accused Russian spy Mikhail Semenko was an active social networker. Semenko and his comrades are a case study in espionage 2.0. He had accounts on LinkedIn and Facebook. He even ran a blog on the Chinese economy. What are the lessons here? Well, first, you should know who you’re connected to on these social networking sites. A Facebook news feed could have been a great source of intelligence for Semenko, if he was friends with the right people–say, a congressman on the right committee who posts a little too much on his Facebook account or even a mid-level civil servant working in a sensitive national security position. It seems hard to believe, but…
Red Dawn Remake with People’s Liberation Army!
So it looks like the classic 1984 war film Red Dawn, starring Patrick Swayzee and Charlie Sheen, is being remade. This time, though, the Chinese will be the invaders. If you haven’t seen the original, you should definitely check it out. Red Dawn was listed as #15 on National Review Online’s list of the Best Conservative Movies.
I’m really fired up for this film. While I’ll miss Swayzee and Sheen, I have high hopes for Connor Cruise, Tom Cruise’s son. More specifically, though, I’m glad that China’s growing military power is starting to get some attention in the popular media. Defense analysts and a handful of policymakers have been watching China’s…
National Energy Tax Bill
From Politico:
Senate authors of a controversial climate change bill heralded EPA modeling results unveiled Tuesday as proof that their plan would have a limited pinch on Americans’ pocketbooks.
Sens. John Kerry (D-Mass.) and Joe Lieberman (I-Conn.) found many reasons to gloat after getting the 74-page study that showed the overall costs from their legislation’s major global warming provisions would cost an average household between $80 to $150 per year.
“There’ll be some people who will want to demagogue that politically, but that’s less than $1 a day,” Lieberman told reporters. “Is the American household willing to pay less than $1 so we don’t have to buy oil from foreign countries, so we can create millions of new jobs, so we…