Saturday, June 12, 2010

Sprott: Not to raise any alarms or anything, but you may want to buy some gold to protect against 'the inevitability of a collapse in the dollar'

ZeroHedge points us to a column by Sprot Asset Management's John Embry (PDF), a cheery missive entitled "17 Reasons to Own Gold". One of the underlying reasons to hold a commodity like gold relates directly to the Obama administration's destructive spending policies, which are removing investors' last backstop from the global economic stage. With the spastic, out-of-control borrowing instigated by the Democrats' failed programs, even the U.S. can no longer be considered a safe haven.

1. GOLD IS RETURNING TO ITS TRUE HISTORIC ROLE AS MONEY


The role of gold in society was succinctly summed up by J.P. Morgan in 1912 when the renowned financier stated that “Gold is money and nothing else.” Ironically, he made that comment one year before the U.S. Federal Reserve was created. There have been long periods (1980-2000 being one) when this immutable fact was dismissed. The fact remains, however, that every fiat currency system in history has ended in ruins.

2. THE INEVITABILITY OF A COLLAPSE IN THE U.S. DOLLAR


The U.S. dollar is the world’s reserve currency and thus anchors the world’s monetary system. Unfortunately, by virtually any measurement we look at, the United States is beyond ‘the point of no return’ with respect to its financial position. Imbedded federal government debt of nearly $13 trillion, unfunded future liabilities in medicare, social security, etc. well in excess of $50 trillion and a current budget deficit of over 10% of GDP virtually ensures ongoing massive monetary debasement. When the near bankruptcy of the majority of the fifty states in the union is factored in, the situation looks even more dire.

3. OTHER SIGNIFICANT WORLD CURRENCIES OFFER NO REFUGE


The current travails of the European Union are well advertised. The recent pledge of nearly $1 trillion in potential bailout money by Eurozone members and the IMF in the wake of Greece’s problems, coupled with the fear of contagion throughout southern Europe, effectively disqualifies the Euro from serious consideration. Great Britain is in such disarray that it doesn’t even deserve comment. Japan has a rapidly aging population and embedded government debt that already exceeds 200% of GDP. Even China, that paragon of all things financial and economic, is suspect. As the result of its bank lending spree in 2009, the country is dealing with considerable overcapacity, an emerging inflation issue and a potential bad debt crisis in its banking system.

4. THE DESTRUCTION OF GOVERNMENT BALANCE SHEETS AND THE WIDESPREAD IMPLEMENTATION OF ZERO INTEREST RATE POLICIES MAY ULTIMATELY RESULT IN HYPERINFLATION


As the result of the global financial crisis which enveloped the world between late 2007 and early 2009, the world’s governments were forced to step in and bail out the financial sector while propping up overall demand in the face of the collapse in the private sector. This unfortunately occurred as their own revenue streams were under severe pressure due to the issues in the private sector. To combat the massive deficits that inevitably resulted, widespread quantitative easing (i.e. unfettered money printing) was undertaken. That policy is here to stay and the fiscal deficits in many countries have now reached percentages of GDP that have almost always resulted in eventual currency collapse. Thus, the frightening term ‘hyperinflation’ is now being heard with increasing frequency...

8. MINE SUPPLY IS NOT ANTICIPATED TO RISE FOR SEVERAL YEARS, IF AT ALL


Despite gold prices surging from a low of $252 per ounce in 1999 to over $1,200 recently, mine production has been eroding for nearly a decade. This suggests that mine supply is insensitive to higher gold prices, a fact confirmed in the 70’s when mine supply actually fell as gold made its historic rise from $35 per ounce to $850. Aaron Regent, the head of the world’s largest gold company, Barrick Gold, was quoted at a conference in late 2009 lamenting the state of the gold mining business. He
went so far as to suggest that global gold production was in terminal decline despite
record prices and the Herculean efforts by mining companies to discover new ore bodies in remote areas. He actually alluded to “peak gold” by implying that production has already reached levels that can’t be exceeded, an expression that is now commonplace in the oil industry...

11. INCREASING SKEPTICISM ABOUT U.S. GOLD RESERVES


The U.S. has long been the world’s largest gold holder with a current reported position of 8,133 tonnes (over $300 billion worth). However, there have been recurrent rumors that the U.S. has mobilized an unknown portion of their gold reserves via swaps to facilitate leasing, a key component in the gold price suppression scheme. The absence of any outside audit of the reserves since the 1950’s and the Fed’s current intransigence towards being subjected to an audit only heighten suspicions that the U.S. does not have nearly as much gold as they claim...

14. [PRICE] SUPPRESSION IS EVIDENT IN THE CONTINUING EXTREME UNDERVALUATION OF GOLD


Measured by any number of metrics (gold price in relation to the staggering amount of money and credit that has been created over the past several decades, gold’s extreme undervaluation relative to platinum, the gold producers’ pathetic returns on capital at the current price, etc.), gold is far behind where we believe it should be. If gold had merely kept up with the reported rate of U.S. inflation since its peak price in 1980, it would presently be trading in excess of $2,300 per ounce.

If you're interested in diversifying your investments with gold, Sprot offers a physical gold ETF (exchange-traded fund) and there are numerous choices for purchasing gold bullion should you require physical delivery.


Disclosure: I have no interest in any of these organizations and simply want Democrats to stop spending our kids' and grandkids' money without permission. Linked by: Ace of Spades. Thanks!

Federal government: yes, we know Obama promised you wouldn't lose your health care plan if you liked it, but he was playing you like a fiddle

When you lose you employer-sponsored health care plan -- you know, the one that you were promised you could keep -- remember to thank a Democrat.

Internal administration documents reveal that up to 51% of employers may have to relinquish their current health care coverage because of ObamaCare.

Small firms will be even likelier to lose existing plans.

The "midrange estimate is that 66% of small employer plans and 45% of large employer plans will relinquish their grandfathered status by the end of 2013," according to the document... In the worst-case scenario, 69% of employers — 80% of smaller firms — would lose that status, exposing them to far more provisions under the new health law.

The 83-page document, a joint project of the departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and the IRS, examines the effects that ObamaCare's regulations would have on existing, or "grandfathered," employer-based health care plans.

Yes, it's true that the president repeatedly promised Americans that those who like their plans could keep them.

Yes, it's also true that he lied.

In fact, most Americans will lose their current health care plans, just like conservatives predicted, over and over again during this debate.

Which is why every Democrat must be voted out of office in November. Every one must go. There are no "conservative" or "moderate" Democrats left. Not when they urinate on the Constitution and spit on the American people, in deference to the orders of Obama, Pelosi and Reid.


Report: Egyptian Foreign Minister says Obama told him to be patient; he will 'show the Muslim world how [to] deal with Israel'

Victor Mordecai, writing in the May 2010 edition of Israel Today (PDF, 4MB), offers this report which, as yet, is unconfirmed by an independent source such as MEMRI.

My wife Rachel, who monitors Arab language broadcasts for Israel Radio, picked up a revealing statement on the “Round Table Show” on Egypt’s Nile TV.

Egyptian Foreign Minister Ahmed Abul Gheit said he had a one-on-one meeting with Obama, who told him that he was a Muslim, the son of a Muslim father and stepson of Muslim stepfather, that his half-brothers in Kenya were Muslims, and that he was sympathetic to the Muslim agenda. He asked the Arabs to show patience.

Obama promised that once he overcame some domestic American issues (like healthcare reform), he would show the Muslim world how he would deal with Israel.

...Pro-Arab, so-called Christian presidents are one thing. But how concerned should we be if the US President is a Muslim who is loyal to the Muslim agenda to isolate and weaken Israel? When the Palestinians talk about nothing but war with Israel and its annihilation, and the president of what was our strongest ally backs their demands for a state with Jerusalem as its capital, and adheres to the same faith, should we not be warning the American public?

...It is time to create an awakening among our true brethren and allies in America: Congress, the Jews and the Christians. We must work together to thwart the emerging alliance between the US and the Arab-Islamic agenda. We must pray for an awakening among the Jews and a Christian revival for Israel’s survival.

In September of 2009, Obama did meet with Ahmed Aboul Gheit. This photo, provided by the State Department, depicts the pair with their spouses.

And it is well-known that Gheit is a true hard-liner when it comes to Israel. One of his recent editorials spelled out his hatred for the Jewish state:

All the Arab sides – both those who support negotiations and the ones who pin their hopes on resistance – must refrain from extending a [friendly] hand to the extremist Israeli government. What we need now is to increase Israel's isolation, to besiege it as an occupying country, and to expose its racist face and gain the world's support for our just causes. If this peaceful siege does not achieve the hoped-for results, we will discuss [what to do] when the time comes.

I repeat: though Obama and Gheit definitely met, the report of the President's statement is unconfirmed. However -- for a guy who marinated in Rev. Wright's anti-American, Hamas-supporting, and antisemitic Church for two decades -- it wouldn't come as much of a surprise to find out it's entirely accurate.


Hat tip: Pat. Linked by: Michelle Malkin and The Astute Bloggers. Thanks!

Larwyn's Linx: The verdict is in -- President Obama is a failure

Have a great link you'd like me to review? Drop me an email. You can also install a Larwyn's Linx blog widget.

Nation

The verdict is in -- President Obama is a failure: Strata-Sphere
Obama's Treachery: AT
Brewer: About that chain migration...: Hot Air

Corrupt Pelosi Congress Looks to Weaken Ethics Rules: RWN
Join a Breakfast with Pelosi: One Hour. Five Grand.: PJM
Chicago Alderman says you're a Nazi: RWN

Economy

The Second Grand Unification Theory of Sucking: VodkaPundit
Pelosi: We'll stop blaming Bush when our his problems go away: BlogProf
The Incestuous 'Financial Reform' Committee: OpenSecrets

Obamacare: Eliminating the Poor and Elderly’s Last Resort: RWN
What a surprise: HAMP failed: Denninger
Asset Manager: Markets are Manipulated by HFT: ZH

Climate & Energy

53 days later, administration doesn't know who's in charge of spill: GWP
NOAA: Temperature Accuracy Doesn't Matter: PJM
Did Ken Salazar Violate Federal Law When He Lied?: Hindenblog

Media

Putting the watchdogs on the payroll: AT
Gun Control and Mass Murder: Lott
Secession? What about Ejection?: AT

The Campaigner-in-Chief Takes Responsibility: Patterico
Tina Brown Says 'Wingnut' Women Blow To Feminism. I say, What Feminism?: RWN
Shocker: Newsweek Compares Alvin Green to Sarah Palin: GWP

Who is Mosab Yousef?: SMY

World

Why Is the State Department Covering for a Known Terror Group?: PJM
Saudi Arabia Gives Israel a Pass: Patterico
Blockades and Muslims: AT

Mahdi Bray's Slipper Evasions: IPT
Emily Henochowicz, American Anti-Israel Activist, Is Left's Next Rachel Corrie: AmPower
British ObamaCare update: First baby born under NHS feels betrayed by system: Marathon

SciTech

Hearing for the First Time: Ace
The iPhone, Net Neutrality and the FCC : WSJ
Black Holes Now Racist: Hot Air

Cornucopia

Mamas, Please Let Your Babies Grow Up To Be Cowboys: MOTUS
Cthulhu awakens on Facebook to terrorize the left: Hot Air
The American Man: R.I.P.: Stuart Schneiderman

Images: Dan Riehl.
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: Save Mosab Yousef: Help Him Stay In The U.S.


Friday, June 11, 2010

Obama strikes back at Arizona: ICE to provide beverage bars, movie nights, dance classes and computer training to illegals

The Houston Chronicle reports that the Obama administration is making things considerably more comfy for illegal immigrants. ICE (Immigration and Customs Enforcement) is rolling out a series of upgrades to detention centers including self-serve beverage bars, continental breakfasts, movie nights, art classes, internet access, computer training classes, bingo, dance classes, decorative plants and a variety of other upscale benefits.

The changes, detailed in an internal ICE e-mail obtained by the Houston Chronicle, were welcomed by immigrant advocates who have been waiting for the Obama administration to deliver on a promise made in August to overhaul the nation's immigration detention system.

The 28 changes identified in the e-mail range from the superficial to the substantive. In addition to “softening the look of the facility” with hanging plants and offering fresh carrot sticks, ICE will allow for the “free movement” of low-risk detainees, expand visiting hours and provide unmonitored phone lines.

ICE officials said the changes are part of broader efforts to make the immigration detention system less penal and more humane.

But the plans are prompting protests by ICE's union leaders, who say they will jeopardize the safety of agents, guards and detainees and increase the bottom line for taxpayers. Tre Rebstock, president for Local 3332, the ICE union in Houston, likened the changes to creating “an all-inclusive resort” for immigration detainees.

“Our biggest concern is that someone is going to get hurt,” he said, taking particular issue with plans to relax restrictions on the movement of low-risk detainees and efforts to reduce and eliminate pat-down searches.

To demonstrate the scale of the problem, ICE houses nearly half a million illegal immigrants annually. Many are convicted criminals (recidivists included) including rapists, drug dealers and murderers.

The unions that represent prison guards are rightfully worried. Reducing pat-down searches will allow weapons, drugs and other contraband into detention centers.

The ICE memo reads as follows:

From: Conry, Steven
Sent: Thursday, May 27, 2010 2:38 PM
To:
Cc:
Subject: Immeidate Attention - New ICE Requirements
Importance: High

Below, please find a list of facility modifications which we will discuss at our
upcoming meeting at 2:45 pm.

In addition [to the policy reforms], CCA will provide the following no-cost
improvements at each of those nine facilities. [Elizabeth; Eloy; Florence;
Houston; Laredo; Hall County; San Diego; Stewart; Hutto]

· Allow visitors to come for as long as they like during a 12-hour period each day and on weekends.
· Increase availability of legal supplies and postage to indigent detainees for legal correspondence.
· Add research resources at the law libraries.
· Play the “Know Your Rights” legal orientation video in each housing unit every day (not in lieu of in person legal programs but in addition to them).
· Increase contact visitation space for legal counsel.
· Design and provide an area at each facility for contact visitation.
· Allow free movement within the institution for detainees of appropriate classification levels.
· Allow detainees of appropriate classification levels to wear their own clothing, within reasonable limitation, and providing non-penal clothing for detainees to wear.
· Eliminate lock downs and lights out for appropriate classification levels
· Reduce the frequency of and, as reasonable, wholly eliminate pat down searches
· Provide more normalized common areas.
· Soften the look for the facility with hanging plants, flower baskets, new paint colors, different bedding and furniture, wall graphics and framed pictures on the walls, and enhance the aesthetics of the living areas.
· Expand programming for detainees to include movie nights, bingo, arts and crafts, dance, walk and exercise classes, health and welfare classes, basic cooking classes, tutoring and self-paced computer training on portable computer stations.
· Provide celebrations of special occasions and allowing a detainee to receive outside, packaged food for celebrations and while visiting with family and friends.
· Increase the number of phones and unmonitored lines for attorney calls.
· Design new menus with greater variety and reduce repetition of food
· Offer continental breakfasts that are completely self serve on holidays
and weekends.
· Provide fresh carrot sticks and celery or other vegetables in a bar format.
· Provide self-serve beverage bars.
· Offer water and tea in the housing areas at all times.
· Provide a unit manger so detainees have someone available to talk to and to solve problems in the facility other than the immediate guard.
· Increase training unique to each facility so staff are aware of the nature and needs of the population of each facility.
· Survey community-based immigration advocacy groups and immigration attorneys for suggestions that may improve communication and ease of access.
· Designate an employee at each facility for consular access issues to improve consular access.
· Ensure third party legal education programs are made available at all ICE sites.
· Provide four hours or more hours of recreation in a natural setting, allowing for robust aerobic exercise.
· Provide email access for detainees, as is currently provided at Hutto.
· Provide internet-based free phone service.

The Obama administration claims that there's not enough money for key defense programs. Minor things like, oh, I don't know -- freaking missile defense!

But there's apparently plenty of money to keep illegal immigrants in clover. Yes, these Democrats are really fine at this governin' business.


Hat tip: Charlie Foxtrot.

Thomas Jefferson, tonight on Hannity

Tonight on Hannity -- a world-exclusive, the first televised interview with Thomas Jefferson, third President of the United States.

Hannity: Sir, thank you so much for meeting with us. It's a unique honor and privilege.

Jefferson: You're welcome, young man. Your industrious society has created many marvels worthy of the American people.

Hannity: Mr. President, President Obama entered office with a huge amount of "hoopla" and an almost messianic belief that he can "heal the environment", fix the economy, and solve problems like global terrorism. But the economy remains in desperate straits, his foreign policy is a shambles, and an unprecedented environmental disaster is underway. What do you make of the "Obama Legacy"?

Jefferson: No man will ever carry out of the Presidency the reputation which carried him into it.

Hannity: His immense, trillion-dollar "stimulus" package puts control of the people's money in the hands of a few central planners. What is your reaction to that strategy?

Jefferson: Every government degenerates when trusted to the rulers of the people alone. The people themselves are its only safe depositories... I know of no safe depository of the ultimate powers of the society but the people themselves; and if we think them not enlightened enough to exercise their control with a wholesome discretion, the remedy is not to take it from them but to inform their discretion.

Hannity: So you are generally opposed to a top-down stimulus package and prefer that the spending decisions reside with the people who pay taxes?

Jefferson: I own that I am not a friend to a very energetic government. It is always oppressive.

Hannity: What about Democrats' tendency to grow the size of government and intrude in every aspect of our lives... from the New Deal's entitlement programs, transportation, energy, health care, etc.?

Jefferson: My reading of history convinces me that most bad government results from too much government.

Hannity: And increasing taxes on the highest earners -- the "progressive" income tax?

Jefferson: A wise and frugal government, which shall leave men free to regulate their own pursuits of industry and improvement, and shall not take from the mouth of labor and bread it has earned - this is the sum of good government.

Hannity: How troubling is it that the amount of debt that the Federal Government is undertaking -- combined with entitlement programs that are massively underfunded -- means that we are passing huge amounts of debt to our children and grandchildren.

Jefferson: It is incumbent on every generation to pay its own debts as it goes. A principle which if acted on would save one-half the wars of the world... Never spend your money before you have earned it.

Hannity: What would you like to say to the those of our current leaders who are operating under ethical clouds: from Rangel, to Dodd, Murtha, Frank, Mollohan, Clinton, Geithner, Holder and Reid.

Jefferson: Our country is now taking so steady a course as to show by what road it will pass to destruction, to wit: by consolidation of power first, and then corruption, its necessary consequence.

Hannity: You've seen one of my "man-in-the-street" interviews, where we ask random people simple questions about current events, like 'who is the Vice President'? We found during the Obama campaign that many of those voting for him were completely uninformed and various surveys confirm that general ignorance about the man and his motives. Is that troubling?

Jefferson: If a nation expects to be ignorant and free, in a state of civilization, it expects what never was and never will be.

Hannity: Mr. President, what are your thoughts about President Obama basically ignoring Republican requests for a bi-partisanship approach to the stimulus package, health care reform and climate change, stating "I won" and to get over themselves?

Jefferson: Bear in mind this sacred principle, that though the will of the majority is in all cases to prevail, that will to be rightful must be reasonable; that the minority possess their equal rights, which equal law must protect, and to violate would be oppression.

Hannity: The concept of welfare, where the state redistributes wealth to the poor even though many could easily work, has been statistically shown to increase single-parent families, a culture of dependency and crime. What are your thoughts on welfare?

Jefferson: Dependence begets subservience and venality, suffocates the germ of virtue, and prepares fit tools for the designs of ambition.

Hannity: Moving to the First Amendment: this concept of blogging, where anyone can be a well-read author or pundit, is a new innovation for politics. Do you believe that blogging is a useful tool to promote Democracy?

Jefferson: Information is the currency of democracy... Educate and inform the whole mass of the people... They are the only sure reliance for the preservation of our liberty.

Hannity: Interestingly enough, the whole newspaper business has suffered mightily with the rise of the Internet. Your reaction?

Jefferson: I do not take a single newspaper, nor read one a month, and I feel myself infinitely the happier for it.

Hannity: Regarding the Second Amendment, Barack Obama has historically opposed private ownership and possession of firearms. In fact, his home city of Chicago has onerous regulations that effectively prohibit guns altogether, yet the city has the highest number of murders per year of any state in the Union. Your thoughts?

Jefferson: No man shall be debarred the use of arms... Every citizen should be a soldier. This was the case with the Greeks and Romans, and must be that of every free state. For a people who are free, and who mean to remain so, a well-organized and armed militia is their best security.

Hannity: How do you respond to Democrats who have made a variety of moves to revive the ill-named "Fairness Doctrine", which threatens conservative free speech and which was already ruled unconstitutional once in our history?

Jefferson: I have sworn upon the altar of God, eternal hostility against every form of tyranny over the mind of man... It behooves every man who values liberty of conscience for himself, to resist invasions of it in the case of others: or their case may, by change of circumstances, become his own.

Hannity: Final question, sir. What about the Democrats' massive dependency programs, entitlement programs, and efforts to censor free speech such as the "Fairness Doctrine"? Doesn't this violate the principles of the Declaration of Independence and the Constitution?

Jefferson: Experience hath shewn, that even under the best forms of government those entrusted with power have, in time, and by slow operations, perverted it into tyranny.

Hannity: Thank you so much for your valuable time, Mr. President.

Jefferson: You are most welcome, young man. Your society is truly a marvel. I can assure you that the founders are proud of you. The blessings bestowed upon you are formidable. But you must protect this precious gift against a devilish foe. This enemy, insidious in its designs, is burrowing at the foundations of our country and has as its aims the destruction of our founding principles.

I call upon you to resist this foe: the modern Democrat Party.


Note: Every Jefferson response is verbatim as reported by BrainyQuote. If statements were made at separate times, they are separated by an ellipsis when combined.
Fox News Ticker: Hijacked from from the brilliant People's Cube.


Congress installs the EPA as the fourth branch of government and, in the process, violates the separation of church and state

Yesterday, 53 Senators voted to destroy our country. They did so by installing the Environmental Protection Agency -- thousands of unelected, leftist bureaucrats -- as a de facto fourth branch of government.

Their thousands of employees cost taxpayers at least $11 billion a year in salary and overhead alone -- even before their new energy taxes go into effect. Through their unconstitutional dictates, they will set all industrial policy in the United States.

For despite the fact that the U.S. federal government is already the world's largest borrower, lender, health care provider, retirement plan administrator, insurer and banker -- despite this, it will now have the additional ability to regulate every business in America. Or only the ones that expel carbon dioxide. Which is to say: every person and business in America.

Doubly Unconstitutional

It's true that the EPA represents an unconstitutional and unelected fourth branch of government. Furthermore, it is unlawful for another reason that leftists will appreciate:

The EPA violates the separation of church and state.

It was Michael Crichton who first described the religion of warming. Since then, "climate science" has been exposed as a faith-based school of thought where biased results supersede legitimate inquiry.

The ClimateGate revelations, put simply, are a series of cover-ups, deleted data, oddly positioned data collection sites, modified algorithms and scientists addicted to funding as they sought UN-approved results.

Climate "science" is truly climate religion and thousands of scientists are speaking out.

It's the Industrial Policy, Stupid

"Cap-and-Trade" has nothing to do with global warming. The idea behind the EPA's regulatory regime was hatched by "Energy Czar" Carol Browner, who headed the agency in the Clinton administration. As an added bonus -- she was also a recent director of "Socialist International", whose mission is "global governance" and which mandates the impoverishment of rich countries to address climate change.

The EPA's new regulations are designed to:

• Tax the energy that you consume -- gasoline, natural gas, heating oil, etc.

• Tax consumer goods since they all involve the release of CO2;

• Tax food products;

• Tax services such as movies, television, Internet service, etc.;

• Tax all carbon dioxide (a trace gas that accounts for 0.0385% -- or 385 parts per million of the atmosphere) and which plants need to live;

• Eventually tax your breathing based upon your body weight and diet;

The Country Hangs in the Balance

The Congressional Budget Office and the Chairman of the Federal Reserve Board have clearly stated that the U.S. budget deficits -- trebled in only 18 months under the Obama administration -- are "unsustainable".

Not content with nationalizing auto companies, banks, insurance companies and the health care industry... not content with trillion-dollar "Stimulus" programs that utterly fail to do that which was promised... not content with an utterly unconstitutional usurpation of Constitutional government, the radical left -- now in command of the Democrat Party -- has initiated the final phase of its plan to collapse Capitalism and the American way of life.

The EPA's new mandates are designed to destroy an economy that is already on life support. And the Democrat Party -- every member -- must be held responsible for the destruction that is certain to occur should they retain control of Congress in November.


United We Stand -- Obama We Fall

By Kelcy Allen

Brick by brick, shingle by shingle, President Obama’s divisive rhetoric is tearing America’s house down.

In his deconstruction and denigration of the most successful political system and prosperous standard of living in human history, Obama seems to show little regard for a unified national spirit—a “United” States.

From his fractious campaign stump speeches, to last month’s Arizona-bashing news conference with Mexican President Calderón, to his alienation of ALL parties involved in the Gulf oil debacle, President Obama—who often spoke passionately about “putting America’s house in order”—seems to have channeled that passion into a manic compulsion to sow dissension and division—to be bipolar not bipartisan.

In his rousing 2008 Hope-and-Change campaign, Obama consistently “brought down the house.” Post election however, this effusive 4-word phrase conveys a different picture—the ceiling of prosperity is caving in, the walls of security are imploding, a once-firm foundation seems to be shifting, and our “house” is under threat of dissolution.

Recently, while giving a commencement address at the University of Michigan, President Obama disingenuously asserted, “The way to keep our democracy healthy is to maintain a basic level of civility in our public debate…we cannot expect to solve our problems if all we do is tear each other down.”

But incivility and derision have become Obama’s modus operandi.

In just 16 months, his constant divulsive vitriol has become banal and predictable; his straw man pitch of “misguided criticisms that echo the failed theories of the past” has grown insipid. His persistent accusation that his ideological adversaries peddle false theories, phony arguments, and petty politics, while his own pushy agenda has proffered no productive solutions, confers our ship of state is an empty, rudderless vessel—awash upon a ruthless tide—listing among rocky shoals.

Obama’s presidency is now sailing over dark waters of envy, division, and fear.

Cap and trade, unchecked immigration and border violence, the misdirected Stimulus, upcoming 2010 elections, emerging census fraud, and now the ongoing hellish Gulf oil catastrophe, have captured our national attention, all the while overlooking the crux of America’s problem—we’ve lost our grasp of history, we’re not working together, and we’re too divided.

American’s have always resolved their differences—they’ve conferred, compromised, and found solutions. But now, there is a scissure—a divide—which Obama’s factious rhetoric has created. And Americans don’t like it—we don’t like division—we want our house in order.

But president Obama has become a splintering homeland wrecking ball.

For almost a year-and-a-half Obama has spewed vintage Marxist drivel—class warfare. His belligerent refusal to rally Americans together has engendered angst, frustration, pessimism, and now outright hostility, across the land.

First it was “all-things-evil” George Bush and that nasty imaginary “status quo.” Then it was rich against poor—haves versus have-nots; Main Street against Wall Street; little cats versus fat-cats; public vs. private; Grandma sick of her healthcare provider, and Grandpa not seeing eye-to-eye with the ophthalmologist. Speech after caustic speech has pitted the poor, defenseless individual against the giant special interests who purportedly dominate Washington—seniors betrayed by CEO’s dumping pensions while pocketing bonuses; those getting prescriptions against the drug companies; young voters misunderstood by their elders; workers who had jobs shipped overseas by conglomerates; the powerless against big money law firms; veterans returning from Iraq and Afghanistan who’d been “misled” into war; coffee vs. tea—it was “any available victim” against the big banks, credit card companies, insurance lobbyists, oil barons, or anyone in a tax bracket higher than your own.

Obama’s finger pointing and “kick ass” negativity is pessimistic and despoiling--we need optimistic leadership with spiritual verve. Obama is a misfit for the task.

If any of the aforementioned societal conflicts contain validity—and many do—you don’t separate America to solve the problem, you mend America—you pull America together to overcome unfairness and discord, and to spread prosperity.

The problem is, Obama is a Progressive—he doesn’t want our help. He needs us separated. If we aren’t separated, government can’t be in control, and control is simply another way to spell Progressive.

An example of fostering division was when Homeland Secretary Janet Napolitano listed individuals that DHS considered possible domestic terrorists—no Muslim extremists, WTO looters, or riotous La Raza secessionists were noted.

Instead, singled out were so-called “right-wing extremists:” Groups or organizations who help authorities during natural disasters; returning US military veterans; short-wave radio enthusiasts; gun show participants; people with signs protesting high taxes; “minute men” assisting law enforcement on our border; people with bumper stickers which decry abortion, advocate for Ron Paul, or show the old yellow Marine Corps motto flag, “Don’t Tread on Me.”

This Obama lunacy created unwarranted tension and has fiercely angered Americans across the nation from every demographic.

There was the Beer Summit. Obama the lawyer, without facts and apparently not versed in hearsay or probable cause, publicly castigated a white police officer who arrested a black professor. Obama’s irresponsible over-reaction raised the ire of police personnel around the country, and tensions were unnecessarily heightened in black communities.

Consider Obama’s vacuous Jobs Summit. Invited were liberal economists, government officials, non-profit representatives, union leaders, environmental advocates, and academia. Not invited was the US Chamber of Commerce, consisting of small businesses representing 116 million jobs.

Also not invited was the National Federation of Independent Business (NFIB), the “Voice of Small Business,” operating in DC, and all 50 state capitals. Obama’s insensitivity to independent business has helped foment lingering animosity and long lasting resentment from private enterprise.

And we can’t dismiss Obama’s dissing of Las Vegas during a town hall where he drew the ire of the mayor by badmouthing that city. Odds are this upset a great deal more Nevadans as well.

In a shameful display of insensitivity, President Obama disrespected New York City while desecrating 9/11. Not only has his terrorist coddling Department of Justice decided to prosecute Muslim Jihadists in the shadow of Ground Zero, he and his liberal left friends—ACORN, RainbowPUSH Coalition, Apollo Alliance, AFL-CIO, among many—have turned 9/11 into a partisan National Day of Service.

Henceforth, 9/11 will be a leftist celebration of activism, environmental justice, and the “greening” of America, not a day of reflection, respect, and remembrance—we’ll now honor liberal service instead of victim sacrifice.

Obama hasn’t just rankled cities, he’s riled states. During the force-fed passage of his health-care bill, some states were given preferential treatment in exchange for votes, which created outcries from neglected states not included in his Chicago-style bribery scam—ACORN voter deceit on a presidential level. “Cornhusker Kickback,” “Louisiana Purchase,” and “Florida Flim-flam” are euphemisms for “Divided We Fall.”

Surely fiscally grounded states such as South Carolina feel resentment when they’re asked to bailout “drunken-sailor economies” like California.

Alongside his new war against the states, Obama is waging a battle to eliminate the 10th Amendment.

If states lose power, Progressives gain power, and our personal freedoms are compromised. DOJ attorneys have written a recommendation challenging Arizona immigration law, while Virginia and twelve other states have filed suit in US District Court, arguing that requiring citizens to buy health coverage or pay a fee for Obama’s coercive health care, is unconstitutional.

And 27 coal mining states, including Montana, Wyoming, Pennsylvania (zealot miners who cling to guns and bibles), and West Virginia, felt buried after a 2008 video tape was unearthed in which Obama said he was willing to bankrupt the 3-million member coal industry.

It’s government versus the people—Obama has drawn a battle line.

If Obama’s attack on states and unfavorable demographic groups can be called his hobby, then trashing our Judeo-Christian heritage while appointing Muslims to his administration, is his full-time job.

A mind-boggling series of virtually unnoticed Obama policy decisions, wherein hundreds of Muslims have intentionally been fast-tracked into the administration, is raising concerns.

And while liberals go catatonic when the separation of church and state is breached, the US State Department’s Bureau of International Information Programs has assembled a range of programs and publications to celebrate Ramadan and Muslim life in America.

Christian leaders Tony Perkins and Rev. Franklin Graham recently had speaking invitations cancelled on military bases, while a new mosque accommodating over a hundred Muslims has opened in our own Washington, DC Capitol Building.

And incredibly, just months ago in January 2010, Secretary Janet Napolitano’s DHS office initiated an official information-sharing program with Muslim organizations—some tied to the terror group the Muslim Brotherhood. The groups now meet regularly with DHS senior aides and with Napolitano, to discuss American national security policy.

Obama’s apparent Muslim bias coupled with his dismissal of Christians and Jews, combined with his growing disdain for Israel, is adding to an ever-widening breach of understanding among the faith communities.

From his stilted veto of the Supreme Court during the State of the Union address; his decision not to salute the patriots buried at Arlington National cemetery on Memorial Day; his blatant failure to acknowledge D-Day on June 6th; his exile of the bust of Churchill; his incomprehensible foot-dragging and cursory show of empathy for our Gulf citizens—Obama has created rapidly-expanding rifts between many once mutually-appreciative segments of American society.

Considering the derisive and destructive nature of the Obama presidency, it would not be unreasonable to profess “United we stand, Obama we fall,” and resolutely declare President Obama to be “The Great Divider.”

Kelcy Allen is a freelance writer. He lives in the Pacific Northwest.

Larwyn's Linx: The Man Who Would Be King

Have a great link you'd like me to review? Drop me an email. You can also install a Larwyn's Linx blog widget.

Nation

The Man Who Would Be King: AT
Senate votes EPA the fourth branch of government: Malkin
On the Table: Doc Zero

The Growing Intifada on our Southern Border: RWN
Democrats' brilliant new immigration strategy: RWN
FBI documents reveal ACORN skulduggery: JudicialWatch

Economy

Union Bosses' Pensions Soar While Members' Wither: RCReader
The Fastest-Growing Set of Millionaires: DaiRec
Next Three Weeks Will Change Wall Street Forever: Minyanville

The Deficit Tripler: GWP
O's Moratorium Killing Tens of Thousands of Jobs: GWP
AIG's $100 Billion I.O.U.: RSM

Climate & Energy

Gulf Oil Spill Reminds Us How Much is Out There: MoneyRunner
Then: Zero Population Growth. Now: Zero Population: Belmont
Senate Surrenders to the EPA: WashExam

Media

Nicholas Kristof and the Left: a Strange Hostility to Hirsi Ali: Steyn
Bad News For Democrats And Obama, Good News for Americans: Riehl
The Secret of America: AT

Sarah Palin's Breasts: TigerHawk
Photographic evidence debunks the Palin 'implants' smear: AmPower
The Search for Intelligent Life in the MSM's Alternate Universe: Hanson

Spin Cycle: After Two Years with Obama, Linda Douglass Returns to 'News' Media: NewsBusters
John Lindsay’s Bright, Shining Failure: City Journal
Birther in the Briefing: Politico

World

Israel doesn't need justification: Shayne
Does Foreign Aid Fuel Palestinian Violence?: MEQ
If We Won’t Fight for Israel, for Whom Shall We Fight?: Hawkins

Cuba Smuggling Terrorists into the U.S. through Mexico and Arizona?: AT
The Islamic Republic of Sudan?: Foreign Policy
Dubai's Tarnished Glitter: AmSpec

The Tampon speaks, environmentally, at Oxford: Fausta
Obama announces Terrorist Stimulus Plan: Exurban
ISM radicals protest at Caterpillar annual meeting: Marathon

SciTech

How to get rejected from the App Store: InfoWorld
Why do Foxconn employees keep jumping off buildings?: ChinaHush
HTML5 vs. Flash: The case for Flash: InfoWorld

Cornucopia

President "Kick Ass": IgnorantME
The Brothers Karamazov: Anchoress
Barbara Boxer: Greatest national security threat is carbon dioxide: BlogProf

Image: IgnorantME.
Today's Larwyn's Linx sponsored by: What's Jerry Brown Done to You?


Thursday, June 10, 2010

The TOTUS Made Me Do It

Today's comment o' the day comes to us courtesy of The Atlantic's Megan McArdle ("Things Obama Probably Wishes He Hadn't Said") who reaches back into the archives to find some now-startling campaign rhetoric.

It's not mentioned much now, but in the late summer of 2008, a major hurricane, Gustav, was in the Gulf of Mexico and headed toward New Orleans, threatening a replay of the disastrous Katrina experience. On September 1, 2008, Barack Obama, fresh from his Roman-colonnade speech on the final night of the Democratic convention in Denver, talked to CNN's Anderson Cooper about Gustav and the Gulf. The question: As president, could he handle an emergency like that?

...Obama pointed to the size of his campaign and its multi-million dollar budget as evidence of his executive abilities. "Our ability to manage large systems and to execute, I think, has been made clear over the last couple of years," Obama said. That executive ability, he added, "indicates the degree to which we can provide the kinds of support and good service that the American people expect."

In other words, running a campaign proves I can run the country.

How's that workin' out, Mr. and Mrs. America?

Anyhoo, in the comments, mfsheldon pens our winner.

During the campaign, all Obama had to do to fix something was give a speech.

Rev. Wright race-hate problem? Give a speech.

Polls tightening? Give a speech.

It was a formula that worked--in a campaign. You cannot govern with speeches, especially when your words are completely at odds with your actions.

Of course, he did not write the speeches. Then again, he did not actually manage his campaign.

Is it at all surprising that his governing style continues to be the "perpetual campaign"?

His shockingly polarizing speech in Pittsburgh last week reveals how little gas remains in the sputtering engine. It was an oddly bitter and partisan attack for a standing President to make. It felt oddly desperate, especially in light of Friday's jobs report.

Mr. President, a bitter partisan tirade will not fix unemployment any more than claiming you will "not rest until the spill is contained" will plug a leak.

The fact that Obama was hobnobbing with celebrities and doing political fundraisers while "not resting" shows what little regard he has for our lying eyes.

Obama simply had no sense that being President is actually a job that requires skills at governance. He never ran a single thing in his life. It shows. He still thinks governance is giving a speech.

The problem is that his speeches have no correlation with his actions.

Does anybody really believe for a single solitary second that we are truly in the "NEW ERA OF RESPONSIBILITY"?

Well said, mfshelton. Well said.