THE FOUNDATION
“[In a democracy] a common passion or interest will, in almost every case , be felt by a majority of the whole; a communication and concert results from the form of government itself; and there is nothing to check the inducements to sacrifice the weaker party or an obnoxious individual.” –James Madison, Federalist No. 10, 1787
TOP 5 RIGHT HOOKS
Obama Jokes About Voting Only Once
In a rare campaign rally appearance, Barack Obama exhorted attendees to get out and vote. “One week, Wisconsin. One week,” he said. “One week from today you get to choose a new governor. And because early voting runs through this Friday, you don’t have to wait until Election Day. You can vote all week.” He then clarified, “I mean you can only vote once. This isn’t Chicago now.” After pausing for laughter, he added, “I’m teasing Chicago, I’m messing with you. That was a long time ago.” Yeah, well, Obama joked about having the IRS audit political opponents, too, and look how that turned out. Voter fraud benefits Democrats, which is why he’s laughing it up.
Leak: Ferguson Officer Wilson Won’t Be Indicted
We already know the autopsy of Michael Brown, the black thug shot by Ferguson, Missouri, police officer Darren Wilson, reveals he was shot at close range and that the evidence so farsupports Wilson’s account. Now, the “hacktivist” group Anonymous says they’ve obtained leaked evidence “from two separate and unrelated sources regarding the long awaited Grand Jury decision” in the case. (They say “regarding the murder of Mike Brown by Ferguson PD Officer Darren Wilson,” so you know where they stand.) According to Anonymous, “On or about November 10, 2014 the Grand Jury decision will be announced. Darren Wilson will NOT be indicted on ANY charges related to the murder of Mike Brown. All local police Chiefs and jail commanders have been notified to begin preparing for major civil unrest.” We suspect the only reason this decision on the shooting was being withheld is that police were waiting for cold weather. Fewer protesters rioters will hit the streets when it’s cold. More…
Obama Fails to Yell ‘Fore’ Prior to Taking ISIL Shot
In September, Barack Obama announced a strategy to fight ISIL – essentially a mulligan in Iraq. Well, it turns out he didn’t really consult with the Pentagon before taking his first shot off the tee, and the ball ended up in the sand trap. Politico Magazine reports, “First, the Pentagon was surprised by the president’s timing, according to a senior defense official. ‘We didn’t know it was going to be in the speech,’ he said, referring to Obama’s Sept. 10 address to the nation. Second, the White House neglected to give Pentagon lawyers a chance to revise and approve the proposed legislative language before it went to the Hill, which is considered standard practice. Staffers working for Rep. Buck McKeon, the Republican chairman of the Armed Services Committee, said they were appalled by what they saw: language so sloppy that it failed to mention adequate protections against so-called ‘green-on-blue’ attacks by trainees on American troops, and effectively left the Defense Department liable for funding the mission against the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) – even though the president was telling members of Congress he didn’t need money for this new mission, since the Saudis were putting it up. ‘What came over would have not have been a mission the DoD could have executed,’ says a senior Republican committee staffer.” In other words, it’s par for the course with the Obama regime.More…
Obama’s Relationship With Israel Deteriorates
The senior White House official who called Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu a chickens–t is only the last American official to fling a barb towards Israel. According to journalist Jeffery Goldberg, the Obama administration has frequently jabbed Israeli leadership for its perceived cowardliness. Specifically, the administration is displeased because the Netanyahu-led government announced settlements in the West Bank, possibly undermining John Kerry’s hoped-for legacy of forging a peace deal. Netanyahu announced those projects to possibly win more favor for a re-election bid, and Obama officials are in a “red-hot anger” over it. Pot, meet kettle. “There is a crisis with the Americans and it has to be treated like a crisis,” the Finance Minister for Israel, Yair Lapid, wrote. “Relations with the U.S. are critical and important to Israel, and everything must be done to resolve the crisis and restore good ties.” This tiff comes at a critical time, when the West is working on a nuclear deal with Iran. Unfortunately, Barack Obama seems determined to damage the U.S.-Israel relationship permanently. More…
Wind Power Blowing Electricity Prices Up
Wind power, Americans were told, was supposed to lower energy prices, but the only thing it seems to be blowing around are dollar bills and rhetoric. Forbes' James Taylor reports: “Electricity prices are soaring in states generating the most wind power, U.S. Energy Information Administration data show. Although U.S. electricity prices rose less than 3 percent from 2008-2013, the 10 states with the highest percentage of wind power generation experienced average electricity price increases of more than 20 percent.” Idaho topped the list at 34%, followed by Wyoming (33%), Kansas (26%), South Dakota (25%), North Dakota (23%), Minnesota (22%), Iowa and Oregon (16%), Colorado (14%) and Oklahoma (the one state that improved, with -2%). That’s a median increase of 20.7%. Energy costs need a cool down, but that won’t happen as long as bureaucratic hot air is the only thing getting blown around. More…
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RIGHT ANALYSIS
Biden Sums Up Obama’s Economic Record
Ebola, ISIL and a host of other crises have pushed the economy from the headlines, but jobs and the anemic recovery are what people really care about in the coming election. And, believe it or not, Joe Biden put his finger on the problem: The middle class is struggling in Barack Obama’s economy.
In his most sagacious statement since taking office, Biden said Obama’s economic policies have done nothing to help the average American. He didn’t quite put it that way, of course, but it’s a fair interpretation. The vice president was touting positive economic growth and deficit reduction on the stump when he oddly concluded that none of it matters. “You know the truth: The middle class is still in trouble,” Biden said. “You don’t have to know the numbers, you can feel it. You can feel it in your bones.” For once he’s right.
It’s plain something is amiss given that 48 million people (20% of the population) are on food stamps and 50 million are below the poverty line.
But there is one good sign. In January, the federal government returned to the policy adopted in the 1996 Welfare Reform Act, requiring more from able-bodied persons who receive benefits. As National Review’s Jillian Kay Melchior explains, “Unless a state has extraordinarily high unemployment or a dearth of jobs, able-bodied adults who are younger than 50 and without a dependent must spend 20 hours a week productively if they wish to continue drawing food-stamp benefits longer than three months.”
This policy shift is important because it will encourage people to get back to work. The workforce participation rate – the number of Americans actually working – has plunged since Obama was elected. When he took office, nearly 66% were employed. Now, the percentage is 62.8 – the lowest since January 1978, during the term of another Democrat president. And Obama’s unemployment numbers are as phony as a three-dollar bill. Forbes says it’s 13%; the Hill says 18%. Whatever it is, we dang well know it’s not the headline rate of 6%.
There are still millions who can’t find work and millions who work part-time because they can’t find a full-time job. Employers, hard pressed by the cost of ObamaCare, are afraid to hire more employees lest taxes, fines and expenses grow any worse. Obama claims to have created 10 million jobs during his six-year tenure, but that’s a debatable figure. And even if it’s accurate, it pails in comparison to his predecessors. (Of course, presidents don’t create jobs, businesses do – in spite of Hillary Clinton’s inadvertent candor the other day.) Under the economic leadership of Ronald Reagan, the economy created 16 million real jobs with a smaller population, and Bill Clinton, still enjoying the fruits of Reaganomics, saw an increase of 22 million.
Yet Obama continues telling us the economy is blazing. “There’s almost no economic measure by which we are not better off than when I took office,” he proclaimed. Just drop the “not” in his boast and he’s on to something.
The good news is, after the expiration of the unemployment extension in January, employers have been more willing to create jobs and workers are more willing to take them. The New York Federal Reserve Bank reported the number of new jobs that had opened each month shot up 20% to 4.7 million by June. And according to The Washington Times, “The rate of job openings also soared to its pre-recession peak of 3.3 percent of all workers just months after Congress allowed the benefits to end after Democrats and Republicans failed to agree on an acceptable way to pay for them.”
This one small change (requiring those on unemployment benefits to work a little) toward a more free-market approach in our economy has produced more than all of Obama’s boastful machinations and lies put together. Perhaps this small step will boost the economy, and, no doubt much to Biden’s relief, the middle class may even begin to recover.
Here Come the Post-Election Executive Orders
On the eve of the 2012 elections, the Obama administration had its fires to put out. Jihadis killed an ambassador and three other Americans in Libya in September. In October, a hurricane blew up the East Coast and gave Obama the opportunity to show the president in action – or to showcase a clumsy government trying to patch things before Election Day. This year, Barack Obama is waiting until after the election for his fireworks.
In some respects, the election two years ago was a harbinger of what this congressional election has become. Before his re-election, Obama delayed the EPA’s ozone rules. That was just one legislative delay. The administrationwaited until after the 2012 election to move forward on 24 “economically significant” regulations. In the months leading up to that election, it worked on only eight.
In this election, the Democrat Party has all but abandoned the president. The governor of Connecticut accepts the endorsement of Bill Clinton, but shuns the fundraisers where Obama makes an appearance. Obama chases after his party, saying that all his polices are on the ballot, but Democrat politicians won’t even say if they voted for the man. The scandals abound in the IRS, the VA, the jihadi prisoner swap for Bowe Bergdahl, etc. And like every other facet of election-year politics, Obama has backlogged his executive actions, waiting until the results come in to release them in one big rush.
This is the home stretch for Obama. This is the last major election until he retires to Chicago, or Hawaii, or wherever his golf-happy heart desires. And that’s why this election is so scary: He has less reason than ever to behave within constitutional bounds. The next two years are his last chance to pad his legacy with imperial actions.
The White House expects a Republican-controlled Congress. Obama’s White House staff is cynical that a new Congress will get anything done. “Republicans in control in the Senate, [Hill insiders] say, would mean two years of obstruction, subpoenas and brutal confirmation fights,” Politico reporter Edward-Isaac Dovere writes. “Instead of 2016 creating pressure to get things done, it will set up yet another cycle of running the clock with the majority up for grabs again in two years.”
So the Rambo in chief will load his pen and heft his phone to go hunting in the swamp along the Potomac. He has prey aplenty. The pundits anticipate Obama’s biggest prize will be some kind ofaction on immigration. He’s promised the Congressional Hispanic Caucus an executive action if they would just be patient, and the ever-political Obama will likely give those all-important constituents something juicy to smooth over the relationship.
And while Attorney General Eric Holder announced his resignation, he hasn’t exactly packed his boxes and left the building, as Obama has yet to nominate a replacement for him. Could the next AG be worse than Holder? The New York Post certainly thinks so, speculating Obama’s first pick may be now-Labor Secretary Thomas Perez – a more radical race baiter than even Holder.
But many of Obama’s delayed actions have also been to avert some more … uncomfortable situations. The U.S. Army is sitting on its completed investigation into Bowe Bergdahl. But we’ll just have to wait until after the election to find out the Army’s assessment of Bergdahl’s actions. By delaying, the Obama administration pushes a summertime scandal out of sight.
To avoid giving the Right rhetorical ammunition, the Obama administration delayed the release of this year’s ObamaCare premium numbers. By all accounts, rates will increase substantially, smacking the low-income earners shopping in the most inexpensive bracket, bronze, with an estimated 14% hike. Worse, a new study says hikes could reach 78%. Such sticker shock would fail to persuade only the most ardent of Obama supporters.
It’s difficult to get a bead on Obama’s real plans because the administration obfuscates the facts so thoroughly. Even lefty journalists in Washington warn about the Obama administration’s stonewalling, intimidation and general lack of transparency on a regular basis.
“I’m worried that whatever happens with this administration, that’s the new floor for the next administration,” said USA Today Washington Bureau Chief Susan Page. “And that we’ll never regain access, ability to do reporting, ability to do our job unless we just constantly fight the battle.”
It’s not just the press/politician relationship that’s at stake. Obama’s phone-and-pen tactics, his lack of accountability and his disregard for the Constitution could set a precedent for future American presidents. The most lasting legacy the Obama administration may leave is putting the word “bully” in “bully pulpit.”
For more, visit Right Analysis.
TOP 5 RIGHT OPINION COLUMNS
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OPINION IN BRIEF
British novelist C. S. Lewis (1898-1963): “Hitherto the plans of the educationalists have achieved very little of what they attempted, and indeed we may well thank the beneficent obstinacy of real mothers, real nurses, and (above all) real children for preserving the human race in such sanity as it still possesses.”
Economist Stephen Moore: “We have seen the denigration of economic success in the war against the rich, the attacks against energy industry profits, tax increases on successful businesses and workers, and health care mandates on employers. Many wonder why businesses are so reluctant to reinvest profits and hire more workers. It is statements like [Hillary] Clinton’sthat give employers pause. Apparently, businesses are virtuous to liberals only when they lose money – in which case they deserve handouts and bailouts. Corporations that try to minimize their tax burdens are attacked regularly in the press and on Capitol Hill as ‘traitors.’ … One of the more noble and rewarding pursuits in life is to start a business. It takes drive, imagination and nerves of steel. Two out of three new businesses fail during their first 10 years. The business owner is the last to get paid, not the first. Only someone who never has started a business would disparage those who do and succeed at it.”
Economist Walter E. Williams: “Poverty is not a cause but a result of Africa’s problems. What African countries need the West cannot provide. They need personal liberty. That means a political system in which there are guarantees of private property rights, free markets, honest government and the rule of law. Africa’s poverty is, for the most part, self-inflicted. … Though there’s a strong case for us to help with the Ebola crisis, the worst thing Westerners could do to Africa would be to send more foreign aid. Foreign aid provides the financial resources that enable Africa’s grossly corrupt and incompetent regimes to buy military equipment, pay off cronies and continue to oppress their people. It also provides resources for the leaders to live lavishly and set up ‘retirement’ accounts in foreign banks.”
Comedian Jimmy Fallon: “Halloween is just a few days away and the Obamas have invited children to go trick-or-treating at the White House on Friday. It will be fun until the Secret Service tackles a kid and says, ‘We finally got one. He’s dressed like a Ninja Turtle and tried to get in here.’”
Semper Vigilo, Fortis, Paratus et Fidelis!
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