How is the Organizer in Chief doing?
He promised 4,000,000 jobs in his first two years as president. So far he claims to have created (or saved) roughly 500,000 jobs. The truth is he isn’t doing well in the jobs department. Just in one sector his brilliant organizing of the auto industry squashed multiplied thousands of jobs. He, like other liberals, doesn’t get it. The government only creates jobs that tax money pays for. If the jobs are government expansion or jobs with salaries paid for by government entitlements or grants, those jobs are a net loss to the country at least for the short term.
Jobs flourish and grow when government stays out of business. All you need do is study the track record of the U.S. government’s handling of finances and what you will observe is absolute failure. Government has never been efficient in the area of wealth management. Those facts do not stand in the way of those who believe government policy is the answer to every ill in America.
If at the end of Obama’s first term there is any growth in the private sector it will not be a result of government stuffed suits making brilliant decisions. America achieved its wealth and greatness because its people have historically had the freedom to create, imagine, and achieve their dreams of providing goods and services without government intervention. In every sector where the government has exercised more control that sector has suffered. The problems we face in the auto industry, health care, and the financial sector are a result of government policy gone airy.
After making a mess of the auto industry, now Obama has set his sights on the health care industry. Even liberals like Senator Chris Dobbs are squealing foul at this early stage. The prospects are scary to say the least.
I am not economist but I did graduate from high school. Obama plans to make health care cheaper and available to more Americans. Fine! How is he going to do it? He will spend just over a trillion bucks (far less than the Kennedy plan of $1.6 trillion) to save several billion. Brilliant huh? What do you suppose my wife would say if over dinner tonight I said to her, “Honey, I have a plan to make us financially secure. I am going to invest $100k of our money and that investment will save $75K. Isn’t that great?” That is the logic of the Obama plan for health care in our country. And, here is the worst part, the trillion or so bucks come right out of taxpayers’ pockets. There is no other source for the government to get money but your money. You, your children, and grand children will pay through the nose for this great savings plan and making health care available to more Americans. That is a huge reason to reject the Organizer’s plan.
Another huge problem is that Obama’s plan will still leave about 30% of Americans uninsured. It is a poor idea with gargantuan costs attached to it. I sincerely hope there will be just enough sanity in DC for this idea to go the way of Hillary care.
What American health care needs is pretty simple. Get government out and pass tort reform. While admittedly, drug companies are making tons of money on over priced products they are not the largest problem. Doctors spend a huge amount of money doing government paper work and paying for malpractice insurance. Most of the government required mountain of paperwork is not necessary. States should govern their medical complexes. And, if sleazy lawyers were unable to keep bringing lawsuits for lazy crooks there would be no need for expensive malpractice insurance.
Frivolous lawsuits are one of the largest industries in our country. There is a way to fix this cancer. There should be caps put on medical findings. And, there should be healthy fines and jail terms imposed on those attorneys who file frivolous law suits. A review panel of doctors, judges, and other citizens should be able to say to an attorney, “Squash this action or pay a find and or go to jail”. This is only a dream I am well aware. Almost every suit in DC is an attorney and the Trial Lawyers have most pols, Democrat and Republican, firmly in their pockets. I know this is off topic but I needed to say it. I know there are some good, honest attorneys; I’ve just never met one. If you are one or know one Great! The ones I have known will do anything for a buck and lying is as natural as breathing.
Blame America first. To date, this is the heart of Obama’s foreign policy. If there is an ill on planet earth, America and its policies are the genesis of the problem, but unbelievably his administration’s policies is the answer. Again and again, president Obama tries to appease our enemies by blaming the United States for everything imaginable. His problem is that even people in the Middle East aren’t buying it. His speech in Egypt did not set well with many leaders in the Arab world. They understand, as I do, talk is cheap. They want to see actual policy enacted that matches Obama’s rhetoric. To Obama and other liberals, talk is the same as doing something concrete.
Hollywood types with IQ’s of turnips make teary talks about hungry kids in some faraway place, or a rain forest in South America, and in their minds and the minds of the listeners, they have actually done something to solve the problem. The reality is that the only benefit of most celeb speeches is the confirmation of just how nutty and out of touch with real people they really are.
We will be able to better access Obama’s foreign policy success or failure near the end of his first term in 2012. It isn’t looking very good as of today.
The Organizer in chief, like other left wingers, has odd ideas about morality. If this were not so gravely serious it would be funny. Liberals from Hillary Clinton to John McCain decry water boarding as torture and it is horrible and unacceptable for a moral nation. Ok, that is a fair debate, I’ll give them that. For the sake of this illustration let’s assume water boarding is torture and immoral.
Water boarding involves one person and that person’s life is never threatened. No person has ever died from water boarding; they only think they might die. So, this method of getting information out of thugs is immoral and unacceptable. On this the liberals have declared the moral high ground.
Obama orders an unmanned drone to fly into a village in Afghanistan and bomb some terrorists and many innocent citizens into the Stone Age and this is moral and applauded by liberals. ( I approved too by the way..) The morality or immorality of bombing that includes innocent loss of life is not the question here it is the hypocrisy of saying water boarding of one individual is somehow less moral than killing scores of people including some innocents at one time. Logic and liberal thought are like oil and water, they don’t mix.
A majority of Americans (53%) are against abortion. Even candidate Obama declared that he was in favor of reducing the number of abortions. It is the exact same position of every liberal running for national office. “Reducing the number” of abortions is liberal speak for making abortion as widely spread as possible. Let me be clear, Obama and every other liberal like Clinton did not tell the truth on this front.
Obama didn’t waste any time making it so that your tax dollars will be spent to make killing unborn babies more possible around the globe, not just here at home. How is that for “reducing” the number of abortions? It was the first or second day of Obama’s presidency that I read on the Whitehouse web site that he had reversed a Bush restriction on spending U.S. money for abortions on foreign soil.
Abortion is the holy grail of liberal Democrats. There is nothing more entrenched in the political mindset of left wingers than abortion on demand around the world. Have you ever wondered why? In 2008 why is it true that no person can rise to the upper echelon of Democrat politics that is not in favor of birth control by aborting the unborn?
The answer is twofold. First, as a whole, liberals have no moral compass. Morality to them is as fluid as deciding where to “do lunch” on Tuesday. It is a morality of convenience. The result is a hodgepodge of stupidity and illogical policy that is taking our beloved America down the sewer.
The second answer is votes. There is no definable limit to what Democrats will do to insure they get and keep political power. If they could have illegal aliens, felons, and the inhabitants of grave yards vote in the mid-term elections in 2010 they would do it in a New York minute. History proves this 100%. Mr. Obama, Organizer in chief, got his political feet under him in the gutter world of Chicago politics. He is a product of that underworld of greed, corruption, vote rigging, and more.
Obama ran on one word, Change! We have change! Are you happy now? We are in for a bumpy ride folks. Tighten those seat belts and hide your wallets, you an’t seen nothin’ yet. The chickens will come home to roost and what a price we will pay!
Agree or disagree, this is the view from my front porch.
Royce
Royce,
I would love to sit and drink coffee on that front porch. Very good thoughts!
The first cup is usually between 6 and 6:30 a.m. Come on over!
I am against abortion. Before my daughter was born with severe malformities 10 years ago (we knew it before she was born) the genetics counselor at the hospital said abortion was the best option. Of course, we did not do it.
I have seen a study where abortions were actually at their lowest levels in decades during the Clinton administration. And we all know he was a “liberal” as you call it. I am not convinced passing a law to outlaw abortion will reduce the number at all. But I do think there will be many abortions done by people not even qualified. Murder is illegal but it has not stopped people from murdering. In fact, the states with the death penalty have the highest murder rates (southern states mostly) with 5.3 murders per 100k people. States with no death penalty like Iowa, for example, 1.4 murders per 100k. So the penalty for murder certainly is not doing much good, if any.
I think passing a law outlawing abortion will do little if anything to stem the tide.
Overwhelmingly, poor women (to a rate of 4 to 1) are much more likely to choose abortion than the middle class or wealthy. I am all for making abortion less of an option by helping with health care, and making adoption much more affordable etc. These are things I see the President pushing for. There is more, but these are the two I can think of.
Will Roe ever be overturned? Not likely. But in the mean time lets work to make abortion rare and less of an option than say, adoption.
You missed the point. Saying you are against murder and then making funds availble to have even more murders is what we are talking about here. I am making the point that our President is NOT for fewer abortions, he is for more and proved it.
I do not believe it is that cut and dried. This is a complex issue for sure. Such is the nature of this truly explosive issue.
Mr Obama did what he did and on the 2nd day of his administration. My tax dollars and yours is making abortions possible that would not happen otherwise, and on foreign soil. If you are happy with this state of affairs ok, I’m not.
I see abortion no different than when people killed babies sacrificing them to idols. Many times these babies were killed as a sacrifice that was suppose to bring them gain in their lives eerily similar to why many people have abortions to make their own lives more convenient to have more gain.
I’m just glad my faith doesn’t rest on who is in the White House. I have dual citizenship – one here in America, the other in the only kingdom that will last, the only kingdom that cannot be shaken – the Kingdom of God.
It saddens and worries me that most Christians don’t see anything wrong with torture – waterboarding included. Just as bad – as you pointed out, Royce – is the cold, disconnected way which all of us can applaud the murder of hundreds by pilotless drones, as if it’s just another video game. Most answers to my position on this would probably seek to justify these actions based on the so-called ‘results’ they achieve. Strange, but I thought most conservatives decried ‘situational ethics.’
Keep provoking thoughts, Royce. Whether or not we agree on every point, it’s still iron sharpening iron.
Brad, I’m sure all of us grapple with these sorts of issues if we are responsible. If one man’s faith conclusions arrive at going to war as a good citizen and another concludes that he should be a pacifist I commend them both. What I do expect is consistency, both in practice and theory as much as is possible.
If we take an honest look at warfare in the Bible we must at a minimum give consideration to the position of agressive offense. It cannot be denied that at times God was with the warriors.
I hate war and that anyone must die due to violence but in a sin cursed world the utopian dream of perfect peace is that, a dream. Only when the Prince of peace comes will there be perfect peace.
Is it ethical and or moral to cause fear/pain to one individual to perhaps save the lives of many? I think the principal of the greater good must be at least considered. I once struggled with a missionary I loved and admired smuggling bibles into iron curtain countries because he was breaking the law. It was unlawful to preach Christ and the resurrection and still is today in some countries but it must be done.
So, there is always an abiding tension between theory and what happens out in the real world where the rubber meets the road huh.
I know you enjoyed John and Maggie this week. They are great folks and I’m sure you are too.
Royce
Could funding abortions in other countries be seen as a big foreign policy issue? If we paid money to have citizens of another country killed by the thousands, don’t you think that would be a scandal? Yet, it is already happening and people think it is marvelous and a big plus for women’s rights. What about the millions of baby girls who get killed each year and will never have the life or liberty to know what “women’s rights” are?
Abortion is political gain. Politicians who are for abortion know by supporting abortions they win people in different ways. Some young women see abortion as a plus and some young men see abortion as a plus, sometimes the woman decides to have an abortion when the man doesn’t want her to and sometimes the man forces the woman to have an abortion when she doesn’t want to. Some parents see abortion as a plus in case their daughter gets pregnant or their son gets a girl pregnant. Thing is no one in these situations are thinking much about giving the child that is being killed a chance to live a chance to make a difference, it’s more about their own lives and their own gain.
Obama said in his campaign he wanted to get people on the Supreme Court who are for abortions who would approve more abortion cases.
While I agree with most of what you say, I must point out that the last sentence is incorrect. Obama didn’t “say” he wanted that kind of judge. I do agree there is little doubt in anyone’s mind that is the kind of judge he wants.
Royce
Thanks for your kind response, Royce. We did enjoyed having John and Maggie; they are definitely a blessing, and we enjoyed them a great deal. Hated to see them go, but I know they’re doing a great work there in Monroe.
I hear you on consistency, but their inconsistency doesn’t change what I feel is right or wrong. I don’t necessarily consider myself a pacifist, although I, like you, commend those who feel like they should be. My beef is not with war; I just don’t consider torture to be in any way consistent with what God would approve of as “war.” I may be unaware, but I don’t know of anywhere in scripture where God told the Israelites to torture their enemies (Although killing every man, woman and child of some of their enemies is a little disturbing, even though God commanded it – but He knows alot more than I do about that decision, and I’m not about to play Job and question Him on it).
Just because peace may or may not be achievable here, that doesn’t mean we should just give up and not try (I know that’s not what you meant, but some could use your statement about unachievable peace until Christ returns to justify that position).
You said,”Is it ethical and or moral to cause fear/pain to one individual to perhaps save the lives of many?” It’s the ‘perhaps’ that gives me pause, Royce. I do consider the principle of the greater good here, and that makes me pause as well.
To be honest, your struggle with your missionary friend wouldn’t be much of a struggle to me, but I’ve never been in the position to have to decide. Acts 4:19,20 comes to mind in that (theoretical, for me) situation.
I’m in full agreement with you on the difference in ‘theory’ and ‘practice.’ I know that I can sit here comfortably at my computer and ponder these thoughts with you, while someone else who doesn’t have this leisure fights for my right to do so. I’ve never fought for my country, never placed my life in danger to defend it. I’ve never been on the front line and had to make a split second decision like that about what to do. I appreciate so much the men and women who do.
Royce, you can’t know how much I enjoy these types of discussions. They help me sharpen the only weapon I do wield (this dull mind of mine). Keep up the good work, brother.
I appreciate discussionss like your and mine too. You are obviously a thinker, a brother, and a gentleman. Now that is a combo hard to beat!
I would never hold your association with Dobbs against you. LOL
Royce
I must have misunderstood Obama in one of his interviews when he was asked who he would like to see on the Supreme Court since he gets to decide during his term on who will go before Congress for a spot on the Supreme Court. We’ll see who he decides to send.
He has already chosen her. Now we will see if the Senate confirms his choice. I sure hope they don’t.
Royce
Sonia Sotomayor and Abortion Rights
Posted by KATHY KATTENBURG in Society on May 27th, 2009 | Comments |
Amid all the coverage of Pres. Obama’s nomination of Sonia Sotomayor to replace David Souter on the Supreme Court, not a whole lot of attention has been given to her views on Roe v. Wade. Charlie Savage has an article about this subject in the New York Times:
In nearly 11 years as a federal appeals court judge, President Obama’s choice for the Supreme Court, Sonia Sotomayor, has never directly ruled on whether the Constitution protects a woman’s right to an abortion. But when she has written opinions that touched tangentially on abortion disputes, she has reached outcomes in some cases that were favorable to abortion opponents.
[...]
Because Judge Sotomayor is the choice of a president who supports abortion rights at a time when Democrats hold a substantial majority in the Senate, both sides in the debate have tended to assume she could be counted on to preserve the Roe decision.
Immediately after Mr. Obama announced his selection on Tuesday, leaders of several other abortion rights groups spoke out in support of Judge Sotomayor, and several conservative groups opposed to abortion rights attacked her, saying they were convinced that the president would not nominate someone who opposed abortion rights.
But in his briefing to reporters on Tuesday, the White House spokesman, Robert Gibbs, was asked whether Mr. Obama had asked Judge Sotomayor about abortion or privacy rights. Mr. Gibbs replied that Mr. Obama “did not ask that specifically.”
[...]
None of the cases in Judge Sotomayor’s record dealt directly with the legal theory underlying Roe v. Wade — that the Constitution contains an unwritten right to privacy in reproductive decisions as a matter of so-called substantive due process. Several of her opinions invoke substantive due process in other areas, however, like the rights of parents and prisoners.
She has also had several cases involving abortion-related disputes that turned on other legal issues. While those cases cannot be taken as a proxy for her views on the constitutionality of abortion, she often reached results favorable to abortion opponents.
In a 2002 case, she wrote an opinion upholding the Bush administration policy of withholding aid from international groups that provide or promote abortion services overseas.
“The Supreme Court has made clear that the government is free to favor the anti-abortion position over the pro-choice position,” she wrote, “and can do so with public funds.”
In a 2004 case, she largely sided with some anti-abortion protesters who wanted to sue some police officers for allegedly violating their constitutional rights by using excessive force to break up demonstrations at an abortion clinic. Judge Sotomayor said the protesters deserved a day in court.
Judge Sotomayor has also ruled on several immigration cases involving people fighting deportation orders to China on the grounds that its population-control policy of forcible abortions and birth control constituted persecution.
In a 2007 case, she strongly criticized colleagues on the court who said that only women, and not their husbands, could seek asylum based on China’s abortion policy. “The termination of a wanted pregnancy under a coercive population control program can only be devastating to any couple, akin, no doubt, to the killing of a child,” she wrote, also taking note of “the unique biological nature of pregnancy and special reverence every civilization has accorded to child-rearing and parenthood in marriage.”
Of course, pro-choice does mean pro-choice, and China’s forced abortion policy does not give women any choice, so Judge Sotomayor’s rulings in the above cases are not conclusive about her views on abortion. It’s also possible that, even if she disagrees with the legal theory behind Roe v. Wade, she respects the authority of precedent even more. But it’s definitely something she should be asked about at her confirmation hearing.
The links in the above quote from Savage’s piece go directly to the pdf of each case, so if you’ve a mind to, you can read them.
http://themoderatevoice.com/33432/sonia-sotomayor-and-abortion-rights/
This judge should be denied a seat on the Supreme Court because of her whacky views on the nature of the U.S. Constitution and that she believes her gender and ethinicity make her more qualified than a white man. Is this not racist? She also has stated that she has no problem with appealing to cases in foreign countries for precident. What a farce!
A Supreme Court justice swears to uphold the U.S. Consitition and to rule based upon it alone. I hope sanity prevails…
Royce
I agree with you Royce. I believe our President Obama has things up his sleeve and not good things and people have no idea what what we are in for.
Just stopped by to say howdy.