Monsters

That's all folks.

Massive Spending. It's not coming to an end.

The Perspective: The video says it all.

What Do Iran's Protests Really Mean?

The Perspective:

What now? Do the eight days of protest signal the beginning of the long overdue end of the 30-year-old Islamic Republic of Iran, or the start of a sustained, systematic repression? Put another way, is this another Velvet Revolution or Tiananmen 2?

Though it is still impossible to predict, my hunch is that in the short run what is being called the Twitter revolution in Iran is unlikely to prompt the immediate collapse of the regime. With so much money and power at stake, the mullahs who have run the country (into the ground) in the name of God will not easily give up as the exhausted communist regime governing Czechoslovakia did in 1989. But will the Supreme Leader and his apparatchiks prevail, as did China in its infamous suppression of the students and workers who protested in 1989 for more freedom? Again, power in the short run seems unlikely to shift to the Islamic challengers from the hard-line clerics in the most serious power struggle the regime has experienced since the Iranian revolution 30 years ago. Ayatollah Ali Khamenei 150,000-strong Revolutionary Guard and 300,000 Basiji vigilantes may well temporarily suppress the uprising with bullets, clubs and tear gas. But in choosing repression, the Islamic theocracy has lost critical legitimacy and become just another of the garden-variety military dictatorships so prevalent in the region.

Plus, the sclerotic regime is unlikely in the long-run to deliver the prosperity with which China rulers placated its rebellious people. Even if the mullahs win this round, the desire for change in Iran seems likely to grow along with the demographic bulge Iran own version of baby-boomers -- the 70 percent of the country that is under 30, many of whom are fed up and want jobs, lower inflation, and yes, more freedom.

The challenge for President Obama is the following: will this titanic power struggle be resolved before Iran acquires nuclear weapons? That, too, seems unlikely, which means Obama may have to choose among the best of several bad policy options.

Here what happened over the weekend and what to look for in the days ahead:

- On Friday, Ayatollah Ali Khamenei, the Orwellian titled Supreme Leader, effectively declared war on his own people, by announcing in his Friday sermon, no less, that the incumbent president Mahmoud Ahmadinejad had been duly re-elected and that the protests over alleged election rigging should end. (For a summary of key points, click here) Ahmadinejad 11-million vote lead could not have been rigged, he asserted. Those who protested to the contrary were riff-raff, ill-wishers, and spies, especially for Zionism. They would get what they deserved if their protests did not stop, and they would be responsible for the bloodshed. On Monday, the 12-man Guardian Council announced that while there was evidence of extensive fraud in the election, Ahmadinejad was still the victor.

- Iranians ignored the Supreme Leader orders not to march and turned out on the streets in numbers unseen since the '79 revolution. By Sunday, 19 martyrs had been killed (the government says there were only 10) in the hit-and-run battles between green wave protestors and the pro-regime Basiji vigilantes, as the government arrested hundreds, perhaps thousands of others. Writing in the New York Post, Amir Taheri estimated that around 3,000 people had been detained, among them, virtually all the key aides to Mir Hossein Mousavi, Ahmadinejad's key challenger, and other opponents, the editors of two of Iran's leading newspapers, 16 officers of the Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps, (charged with implementing the repression) and dozens of clerics and theology students who are backing the opposition. State TV said that 457 had been arrested in one day.

- Mir Hossein Mousavi, a former prime minister and the key challenger, a founder and card-card carrying member of the Islamic theocracy, has now found himself cast in the unlikely role of accidental leader of this uprising, which is now no longer just about an alleged stolen election, but about the legitimacy of the Islamic Republic. So far, he seems to have risen to the occasion. Announcing that he was ready for martyrdom, he demanded a new election and called upon his followers to conduct nation-wide strikes if he is arrested. Gary Sick, whose Internet site, Gulf 2000 -- along with Andrew Sullivan's blog, The Daily Dish -- has provided indispensable updates from Iranian academics, journalists, experts, and Iranians on the front lines of this battle, said Sunday he was convinced that Mousavi was evolving into a true leader of the forces that had threatened to spin out far beyond his control. Noting that Mousavi called for a new type of political life in the country and free expression in all its forms, Sick concluded that Mousavi had issued a truly revolutionary statement.The repression and disdain of the government has brought the opposition to a place they probably never dreamed of going. And no one knows where any of the parties are likely to go next. But for outside observers, he said, it is like standing on the edge of a glacier and feeling the ice begin to crack under your feet.

- By Sunday night, the blood-stained face of Neda, a beautiful young Iranian woman who was allegedly shot by Basiji and died on the streets of Teheran with her philosophy professor hovering helplessly over her was being seen on Web sites throughout the world. Tributes to Iran's symbolic martyr and calls to mourn her have been deluging YouTube.

What should we be watching for in the days ahead?

-- A deepening split within the senior ranks of the clergy. As Ali Ansari wrote in the Guardian on Sunday, the silence of many of Iran's clergy suggests their alienation from the regime that now rules in their names. Ansari reports that Ayatollah Sanei, one of the most senior clerics in Qom who was a close companion of revolutionary founder Ayatollah Ruholllah Khomeini, complained that his protest was unlikely to have any impact on Iran's rulers. Even more worrisome to the Supreme Leader, he added, five senior clerics have protested the elections and the violence that has followed. And Ayatollah Hossein Ali Montazeri, the former heir to Khomeini, who was pushed aside in an earlier political struggle after having criticized the lack of freedom in Iran, has now openly condemned the elections. Neither Ahmadinejad, nor his master's voice, Ayatollah Khamenei, are popular in Qom, notes Professor Ansari, who heads Iranian studies at St. Andrews College. The clerics may bide their time, but their intervention, which may come sooner rather than later -- especially if violence spreads -- could be decisive. The defection of the clergy could spell serious trouble for the Supreme Leader. In theory, notes Iranian analyst Hooshang Amirahmadi, the 86-member Council of Experts, all clerics, can unseat him.

-- Calls for a national strike could be as deadly, if not more so, to the regime than the bloody protests that have outraged Iranians and Iran watchers throughout the world. If the street protests end, this could very well be Mousavi's next step.

In the short-run, brute force is likely to overpower the protests, unless the regime fundamentally miscalculates and outrage spreads. But however this phase of the crisis ends, the Islamic Republic will not be the same. Now that Obama's rhetoric has finally caught up with Iranian reality on the ground and American idealism, his laser-like focus on negotiations with Teheran should factor in the broader struggle for freedom being waged by Iranian whose haunting images fill the Internet and airwaves day after day.

Iran's At The Tipping Point

The Perspective:

Why did the Grand Ayatollah Khamenei decide to suppress demonstrations and not order a reorganization of new elections to solve the crisis? What is the analysis inside the Khamanei/Ahmedinijad “war room”? Based on several assessments, it appears that the regime feels the protest movement is too wide and too determined to allow it to expand further.

The ayatollahs in charge of the “revolution” and the top commanders of the Revolutionary Guards as well as their financial operatives fear a popular shift inside Iran’s population along the magnitude of East Europe’s revolution against Soviet rule. The most cataclysmic parallel would be with the fall of Romanian communist dictatorship under Ceausescu. Even a change a la Gorbachev is too dangerous for the elite that ruled Iran with an iron fist for three decades. Hence, after a minute calculus, the top mullahs and their militia barons have decided not to open Pandora’s box to bring reform or democracy to their own world. And, the world should expect them to use all the power at their disposal to do away with the demonstrations and its leaders.

But how will the Khomeinist “war room” break up the uprising? What is their plan?

One would assume that after a thorough review of the real opposing forces on the ground, and after having secured what they believe is a solid allegiance by the Pasdaran and Bassij commanders along with assurances they may have obtained that Iran’s armed forces will remain distant from the crackdown, the regime will proceed in several directions:

- Put pressure on Musavi and the leading reformer figures such as Rafsanjani and Khatemi

-Deploying the militias and security forces across the capital and in other cities

- Taking back Tehran block after block while trying to avoid an international media backlash

- Arrest and neutralize student and civil society leaders; and at the same time, insure that Western Government, particularly the United States would remain distant from “meddling in Iran’s business.”

So what would be the opposition’s plan? What are the hopes and projections of Musavi and his supporters? The former prime minister and his allies might wish that Khamenei and the supreme Council would find a better solution which would allow a negotiated solution and a lasting settlement. He wants to defeat Ahmedinijad but not, no yet anyway, bring down the regime. However, there is more than one “opposition” group in the country and the most daring groups have already taken to the streets to resist the Ayatollahs and bring a real change — not to recount the votes. Thus, one has to expect a long haul for the opposition.

But is it true that a strong U.S. position in favor of the Iranian democracy movement would create a backlash against America? The reality is that those who are advancing this argument are in fact trying to shield the Iranian regime in the West. The Khomeinist propaganda machine is unleashing all doubts possible about international support to the demonstrators. In fact, the tipping point against the ayatollahs’s militias is precisely a world outcry in defense of the uprising. Presently there are no neutral Iranians who could be irritated by American or Western verbal support to democracy in Iran. The argument is inserted in the debate to confuse the public and mollify outside solidarity. What can shift the ground against the oppressive Pasdaran is precisely this, if a wide majority of Iranians feel the international community is, at least morally, on their side.

The militias will try to suppress the masses, but the latter may take the struggle to a higher ground and perform strikes that paralyze the country. In short, this time the Khomeinists won’t have it easily. Too much power and wealth has disconnected them from their citizens.

Iran’s youth is at the vanguard of huge disenfranchised segments of society including women, workers, and ethnic minorities. The largest segments of the population haven’t joind the clash yet. Our bet from the sociological sample we’ve seen is that when that happens, an earthquake may occur. The ayatollahs and their extended clientele are rushing the regime’s army to crush the revolt in the womb. Badly advised in the past, the U.S. administration is still hesitant to engage with its real future partner, the people.

But a chain of developments inside Iran may change opinions across the Potomac. We sincerely hope Washington would catch up with the change coming from the East, faster.

The Letter Everyone Should Read

The Perspective: I didn't write this myself, this is from a letter that was sent to my friend Glenn Beck .

Well, these are briefly my views and issues for which I seek representation:

One, illegal immigration. I want you to stop coddling illegal immigrants and secure our borders. Close the underground tunnels. Stop the violence and the trafficking in drugs and people. No amnesty, not again. Been there, done that, no resolution. P.S., I'm not a racist. This isn't to be confused with legal immigration.

Glenn Beck's Common Sense Now available in book stores nationwide...

Two, the TARP bill, I want it repealed and I want no further funding supplied to it. We told you no, but you did it anyway. I want the remaining unfunded 95% repealed. Freeze, repeal.

Three: Czars, I want the circumvention of our checks and balances stopped immediately. Fire the czars. No more czars. Government officials answer to the process, not to the president. Stop trampling on our Constitution and honor it.

Four, cap and trade. The debate on global warming is not over. There is more to say.

Five, universal healthcare. I will not be rushed into another expensive decision. Don't you dare try to pass this in the middle of the night and then go on break. Slow down!

Six, growing government control. I want states rights and sovereignty fully restored. I want less government in my life, not more. Shrink it down. Mind your own business. You have enough to take care of with your real obligations. Why don't you start there.

Seven, ACORN. I do not want ACORN and its affiliates in charge of our 2010 census. I want them investigated. I also do not want mandatory escrow fees contributed to them every time on every real estate deal that closes. Stop the funding to ACORN and its affiliates pending impartial audits and investigations. I do not trust them with taking the census over with our taxpayer money. I don't trust them with our taxpayer money. Face up to the allegations against them and get it resolved before taxpayers get any more involved with them. If it walks like a duck and talks like a duck, hello. Stop protecting your political buddies. You work for us, the people. Investigate.

Eight, redistribution of wealth. No, no, no. I work for my money. It is mine. I have always worked for people with more money than I have because they gave me jobs. That is the only redistribution of wealth that I will support. I never got a job from a poor person. Why do you want me to hate my employers? Why ‑‑ what do you have against shareholders making a profit?

Nine, charitable contributions. Although I never got a job from a poor person, I have helped many in need. Charity belongs in our local communities, where we know our needs best and can use our local talent and our local resources. Butt out, please. We want to do it ourselves.

Ten, corporate bailouts. Knock it off. Sink or swim like the rest of us. If there are hard times ahead, we'll be better off just getting into it and letting the strong survive. Quick and painful. Have you ever ripped off a Band‑Aid? We will pull together. Great things happen in America under great hardship. Give us the chance to innovate. We cannot disappoint you more than you have disappointed us.

Eleven, transparency and accountability. How about it? No, really, how about it? Let's have it. Let's say we give the buzzwords a rest and have some straight honest talk. Please try ‑‑ please stop manipulating and trying to appease me with clever wording. I am not the idiot you obviously take me for. Stop sneaking around and meeting in back rooms making deals with your friends. It will only be a prelude to your criminal investigation. Stop hiding things from me.

Twelve, unprecedented quick spending. Stop it now.

Take a breath. Listen to the people. Let's just slow down and get some input from some nonpoliticians on the subject. Stop making everything an emergency. Stop speed reading our bills into law. I am not an activist. I am not a community organizer. Nor am I a terrorist, a militant or a violent person. I am a parent and a grandparent. I work. I'm busy. I'm busy. I am busy, and I am tired. I thought we elected competent people to take care of the business of government so that we could work, raise our families, pay our bills, have a little recreation, complain about taxes, endure our hardships, pursue our personal goals, cut our lawn, wash our cars on the weekends and be responsible contributing members of society and teach our children to be the same all while living in the home of the free and land of the brave.

I entrusted you with upholding the Constitution. I believed in the checks and balances to keep from getting far off course. What happened? You are very far off course. Do you really think I find humor in the hiring of a speed reader to unintelligently ramble all through a bill that you signed into law without knowing what it contained? I do not. It is a mockery of the responsibility I have entrusted to you. It is a slap in the face. I am not laughing at your arrogance. Why is it that I feel as if you would not trust me to make a single decision about my own life and how I would live it but you should expect that I should trust you with the debt that you have laid on all of us and our children. We did not want the TARP bill. We said no. We would repeal it if we could. I am sure that we still cannot. There is such urgency and recklessness in all of the recent spending.

From my perspective, it seems that all of you have gone insane. I also know that I am far from alone in these feelings. Do you honestly feel that your current pursuits have merit to patriotic Americans? We want it to stop. We want to put the brakes on everything that is being rushed by us and forced upon us. We want our voice back. You have forced us to put our lives on hold to straighten out the mess that you are making. We will have to give up our vacations, our time spent with our children, any relaxation time we may have had and money we cannot afford to spend on you to bring our concerns to Washington. Our president often knows all the right buzzword is unsustainable. Well, no kidding. How many tens of thousands of dollars did the focus group cost to come up with that word? We don't want your overpriced words. Stop treating us like we're morons.

We want all of you to stop focusing on your reelection and do the job we want done, not the job you want done or the job your party wants done. You work for us and at this rate I guarantee you not for long because we are coming. We will be heard and we will be represented. You think we're so busy with our lives that we will never come for you? We are the formerly silent majority, all of us who quietly work , pay taxes, obey the law, vote, save money, keep our noses to the grindstone and we are now looking up at you. You have awakened us, the patriotic spirit so strong and so powerful that it had been sleeping too long. You have pushed us too far. Our numbers are great. They may surprise you. For every one of us who will be there, there will be hundreds more that could not come. Unlike you, we have their trust. We will represent them honestly, rest assured. They will be at the polls on voting day to usher you out of office. We have cancelled vacations. We will use our last few dollars saved. We will find the representation among us and a grassroots campaign will flourish. We didn't ask for this fight. But the gloves are coming off. We do not come in violence, but we are angry. You will represent us or you will be replaced with someone who will. There are candidates among us when hewill rise like a Phoenix from the ashes that you have made of our constitution.

Democrat, Republican, independent, libertarian. Understand this. We don't care. Political parties are meaningless to us. Patriotic Americans are willing to do right by us and our Constitution and that is all that matters to us now. We are going to fire all of you who abuse power and seek more. It is not your power. It is ours and we want it back. We entrusted you with it and you abused it. You are dishonorable. You are dishonest. As Americans we are ashamed of you. You have brought shame to us. If you are not representing the wants and needs of your constituency loudly and consistently, in spite of the objections of your party, you will be fired. Did you hear? We no longer care about your political parties. You need to be loyal to us, not to them. Because we will get you fired and they will not save you. If you do or can represent me, my issues, my views, please stand up. Make your identity known. You need to make some noise about it. Speak up. I need to know who you are. If you do not speak up, you will be herded out with the rest of the sheep and we will replace the whole damn congress if need be one by one. We are coming. Are we coming for you? Who do you represent? What do you represent? Listen. Because we are coming. We the people are coming.

The Rigged Iran Elections and What They Really Mean

The Perspective: The Supreme Leader of Iran has spoken, and it is Mahmoud Ahmadinejad for another four years. A major, cataclysmic war is the most likely outcome of the Iranian elections. And the battle lines are clear. It's Netanyahu vs. Ahmadinejad -- Bibi vs. Mahmoud -- and the big question is: Who will strike first?

This weekend's events in Iran tell us a lot.

First, the results prove that Supreme Leader Ayatollah Khamenei firmly, completely and whole-heartedly supports Ahmadinejad's End Times beliefs. Khamenei also fully supports Ahmadinejad's commitment to build nuclear weapons and long-range, high-speed ballistic missiles. There is no daylight between Khamenei and Ahmadinejad on this Radical eschatology, or End Times theology, as some analysts and commentators have suggested. These two men are who I have said all along they are: members of an apocalyptic, genocidal death cult. They are kindred spirits. They believe the wind is at their backs, that Allah is on their side, and they believe they will soon see complete victory. That's what makes them so dangerous.

Second, the results prove that the people of Iran never had a real choice. This wasn't a real election. It was totally and completely rigged by a Radical Muslim mafia. The aftermath became, as one Iranian noted over the weekend, a Tehran Tiananmen. Protesters and dissidents were beaten, arrested and tortured. Text messaging was turned off. Facebook was shut down. The internet was down or slowed for vast stretches. All this prevents ordinary citizens from mobilizing their opposition to the government. That said, however, the massive turnout at the polls -- and the street demonstrations and violence in Iran over the weekend -- showed that even though Iranians didn't have real Reformer candidates to choose from, the vast Iranians are deeply disgusted with the current regime. They long for true freedom and true democracy. They desperately wanted the elections to be real. They are ABA -- Anybody But Ahmadinejad. They don't buy into the regime's End Times theology. They desperately want someone to liberate them. I feel for them. I want them to be free. Now more than ever.

Third, the results prove that the Obama administration's belief that you can sit down and have a rational discussion with such Radicals -- or trust an agreement even if one could be negotiated with them -- is nonsensical. How could we possibly trust the Iranian leadership to keep a promise to stop building nuclear weapons (if such a promise were made), when they steal elections and beat and torture dissidents in front of the whole world?

Fourth, as for Israeli Prime Minister Netanyahu's speech, he was right: Iran is the real threat to the region and the world, not Israel's refusal to make more "land for missiles concessions" to the Palestinian leadership.

The Invisible War

The Perspective:

The foiled synagogue bombing plot shows us one thing: We are truly the victims of our own success. I noted this week that this is a triumph for law enforcement, but it’s also a subtle reminder of how the fight against radical Islamic terrorism isn’t over — most importantly, it’s not over on the home front.

This event obviates it, sure. But in our postmodern mentality, there’s a certain bit of cognitive dissonance about impending terrorist attacks. The threat level offered by Homeland Security is background noise, discussions of terrorism are simply examples of fear-mongering, and the closing of Guantanamo Bay is a priority, moreso than effectively communicating a new strategy of fighting terror.

This last is actually the most pertinent to the Obama administration, because his speech, while certainly a testament to his good faith in the rule of law, put forward no such new strategy. Instead, it focused, as his speeches tend to focus, on the rhetoric surrounding the debate. In this, Obama provided nothing new aside from his own desire to dismiss his dissenters as those too focused on the past — but in a way, it’s Obama who, despite frequently talking about the last eight years, seems to have learned nothing.

Perhaps this is because being direct about these issues puts him in political jeopardy. As Karl Rove notes in his thoughtful Wall Street Journal op-ed on Thursday, Obama has indeed backtracked on a number of national security initiatives. This shows a calculating and thoughtful side to the president that is, in some way, reassuring.

What is not reassuring, however, is his unwillingness to come out and speak directly about his intentions. This is a longstanding characteristic of this man prior to the White House. I suspect that over time, we will see more of this pattern. He will continue to pledge greater transparency, to call for respectful debate in his speeches, all the while offering little substance to the people hanging on his words.

It’s not evil. It’s just disappointing. A thoughtful man reluctant to share his thoughts with the people who depend on them.

The Homegrown Threat

The Perspective: The dramatic foiling of a year-long plot to blow up two New York City synagogues and shoot down military planes at an Air National Guard base in Newburgh, New York has important lessons for combating terrorism in America. First, it reinforces the New York Police Department’s argument that militant Islamic terrorist threats to the United States may increasingly be homegrown.

Law enforcement officials say they believe that at least three of the four accused were converts to Islam, that all four had been in prison. One of them was on parole. One official said that they may have met and perhaps been radicalized while attending a post-prison release rehabilitation program in Newburgh, some 70 miles north of New York City.

Second, a law enforcement official said that the disruption of the plot illustrates the importance of having police surveillance in place “at the right time and the right place” given how quickly the operational part of the planned attack unfolded. According to the complaint charging the three African-Americans and one Haitian-born immigrant with conspiring to use WMD in the United States, the men decided to get weapons to attack their targets at a meeting on December 5, 2008. This means that the plot went into high gear in less than six months.

Third, the incident demonstrates the importance of a smooth working relationship between the Federal Bureau of Investigation, which led the investigation, and the New York Police Department. In recent years, relations between the agencies have been strained over access to information in counter-terrorism cases and by other turf issues. But both Federal and local officials said today that cooperation had improved significantly since the appointment last December of a well-respected G-man, Joseph M. Demarest Jr., to head the FBI’s powerful New York office. Both NY Police Commissioner Ray Kelly and Mr. Demarest were on hand at the press conference last night describing details of the alleged plot.

Fourth, the disruption of the attack depended in large part on information provided by a “confidential witness,” an informant whom the FBI recruited six years ago and sent to Newburgh after pleading guilty in 2002 to criminal fraud and being sentenced to five years of probation. The complaint quotes a FBI official as saying that the information the informant provided during this and other investigations “has proven to be accurate and reliable” and has been “corroborated by other evidence.”

Finally, while Washington is mired in debate about how and where Gitmo detainees should be held and/or tried, the foiled plot in New York demonstrates that the terrorist threat to America, and to New York in particular, did not end with Obama’s election as president, but rather, remains alive and well. James Cromitie, the plot’s alleged ringleader, is an American citizen and convert to Islam. Also known as “Abdul Rahman,” Cromitie was released in 2004 after having served four years in prison for selling drugs in a school zone. To the best of law enforcement’s knowledge, he had never met anyone from Al Qaeda or a terrorist group. Yet the complaint quotes him last November lamenting the fact that “the best target [the World Trade Center] was hit already.” That left a strike at Iraq and Afghanistan-bound military aircraft and an attack on synagogues as the best fallback targets. “I hate those motherf***ers, those f***ing Jewish bastards,” the complaint quotes Cromitie as saying. “I would like to get [to destroy] a synagogue.”

Onta Williams, known as “Hamza,” 33, had also served a year in jail in 2003 for possessing a controlled substance, believed to be cocaine, a law enforcement source said. Last April, the complaint says, he declared “in substance” that “they [the U.S. military] are killing Muslim brothers and sisters in Muslim countries, so, if we kill them here [in the United States]…it is equal.”

The FBI supplied the alleged plotters with three mock “impromptu explosive devices” containing 30-plus pounds of phony C-4, which Cromitie placed on Wednesday night in cars parked in front of two synagogues, including the Riverdale Jewish Center. Had it been real, that much C-4 could have significantly damaged the building, which was scheduled to hold three services on Thursday morning at 6:05 am, 6:45 a.m. and 7:45 a.m.

Law enforcement officials say that the men were going to explode the IED’s remotely by cell phone as they attacked Afghanistan and Iraq-bound aircraft taking off from Stewart International Airport in Newburgh. But the stinger missiles the informant had provided were, fortunately, as phony as the IED’s.

All four men are presumed innocent until proven guilty, of course, and whoever winds up defending them will undoubtedly argue that that the informant egged the four men on and provoked them into staging the attack. There is still much we don’t know about how and where the men met, how and where they were radicalized, and whether in fact their alleged violent tendencies were enflamed by the informant.

But the foiling of the plot seems at face value a clear success for the FBI and NYPD. The sense of vindication today is especially keen within the NYPD, which in 2007, released a 90-page assessment of the terrorist threat facing the nation. The study argued that the primary terrorist threat to New Yorkers—indeed, to all Americans—comes not from Al -Qaeda in Iraq or from the mountainous tribal region between Pakistan and Afghanistan, as the intelligence community in Washington asserted that same year in its national intelligence estimate. Rather, the NYPD concluded, the main terrorist threat was increasingly homegrown. While Al Qaeda remained a vital source of “inspiration and an ideological reference point,” the study concluded, the more insidious terrorist threat came primarily from younger Muslim men between the ages of 15 and 35 who have no direct Al Qaeda connection, but who become radicalized by exposure to an “extreme and minority interpretation” of Islam.

That seems to be the case in this latest of the homegrown plots interrupted by the NYPD and the FBI.

Obama...Let Me Count The Ways

The Perspective:

In his commencement address at Arizona State University on May 13, President Obama said that, “building a body of work…is about the daily labor, the many individual acts, the choices large and small that add up to a lasting legacy.”

As he fulfills this definition in his presidency, let’s look at eighteen hard and soft positions belonging to Barack Obama and his administration to evaluate whether—so far—the results are good or bad for the country.

1. ENEMIES LIST

• Hard on condemning their critics (especially Rush Limbaugh).

• Soft on condemning radical Islamic terrorism (even to the point that Obama’s Homeland Security Secretary avoids the term, preferring “man-caused disasters”).

2. TERRORISM

• Hard on closing the Guantanamo Bay prison by the end of the year and halting tough interrogation procedures.

• Soft on explaining what will happen if released terrorists do more harm at home or abroad and also explaining how easing up on captured terrorists helps prevent future attacks that are as bad as or worse than September 11, 2001.

3. MIDDLE EAST

• Hard on demands on Israel (asking it to make even more concessions to its enemies).

• Soft on pressuring the Palestinians, the Iranians and those who want to see Israel destroyed.

4. TAXES

• Hard on increasing taxes on those who pay the most (while assuming their commercial behavior won’t be affected by confiscations of their wealth).

• Soft on justifying why more money should be given to those who pay little or no taxes (while assuming they’ll paid back for “spreading the wealth around” by voting for Democrats).

Going Green? Only if "Green" means money

The Perspective:

The central question in the debate over global warming and cap-and-trade has nothing to do with the environment or even with energy. It’s all about one thing: revenue. Kudos to Republican leaders for taking a clear stand that they will oppose any global warming bill that raises federal taxes, but as long as Democrats refuse to make the same commitment, the global warming debate is about one thing: revenue.

The bottom line here is that under the Obama administration’s plan money from ordinary energy consumers that will be taken out of their pockets to fund big government special interest spending programs in Washington and bailouts on Wall Street. That’s why the White House put the expected revenue from its cap-and-trade plan into the budget to pay for its spending programs. That’s why Harry Reid noted that the money that will come in from the cap-and-trade plan would be about that same amount that as what he’d like to spend on a government takeover of the health care system! And that’s why proponents of cap-and-trade don’t seem bothered by the fact that the program would have no discernible impact on global averages temperatures or any of the supposed impacts of global warming. It’s all about the money.

That’s where the NoClimateTax.com pledge comes in. Through this Web site, thousands of activists have been asking members of Congress and state legislators to sign a pledge and make a firm written commitment not to use a global warming bill as a vehicle for raising revenue.

Last week Republican Leader John Boehner, Whip Eric Cantor, Conference Chairman Mike Pence, and Energy and Commerce Committee Ranking Member Joe Barton all signed the NoClimateTax.com pledge, which says:

“I, ___________, pledge to the taxpayers of the State of _____ and to the American people that I will oppose any legislation relating to climate change that includes a net increase in federal government revenue.”

In doing so they joined the leader of House conservatives, Republican Study Committee Chairman Tom Price, 20 other Republican members of Congress, and 112 state elected officials who had already signed the pledge.

As the number of signers grows, it will become more and more clear that members of Congress who are unwilling to sign are really more interested in raising federal revenues than addressing global warming.

By taking the pledge Republican leadership put the ball firmly in the court of House Democratic leadership. If Nancy Pelosi and Steny Hoyer will make the same commitment to the American people that John Boehner and Eric Cantor have already made, then we can move forward with an honest debate about what, if anything, should be done about global warming without the possibility of a tax hike lurking in the background. If they refuse to sign, then we can simplify this whole debate to one question: do we want a big tax hike on energy?

“If Republicans convince voters that clean energy legislation amounts to a new tax, Obama’s plan is toast.”

If Democrats want to save their faltering plan, they should sign the NoClimateTax.com pledge and get to work on a bill that doesn’t raise taxes.

One Word: Failure

The Perspective:

White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs has given the Obama administration a “B-plus” for its first 100 days and has graded the news media a “strong A;” but both should be flunked for failing to admit that Barack Obama is rationing where he shouldn’t and not rationing where he should.

Obama’s sweeping health care reform proposals are ridden with rationing when you look behind the code language and stealth tactics. Just recently, on “Meet the Press,” Lawrence Summers, Obama’s chief economic adviser, talked about “experts” who, using “the right kind of cost effectiveness…estimate that we could take as much as $700 billion a year out of our health care system” by eliminating unnecessary procedures.

Under Obamacare, those “experts” will be government bureaucrats — not doctors. Obama’s stimulus package dedicates $1.1 billion to medical “comparative effectiveness research.” This is Obama-speak for bureaucrats determining if your doctor is using what the government deems are the right procedures at appropriate costs. Other than Gibbs and the see-hear-and-speak-no-rationing mainstream media reporters, who doesn’t acknowledge that health care rationing is baked into Obama’s health care plans?

Rationing is also an important part of other of Obama’s priorities. Although President Obama pays lip service to educational reform, including the expansion of charter schools, Obama opted for rationing when his Education Department ended the Opportunity Scholarship Program that had provided 1,714 mostly black and Hispanic children in the District of Columbia with $7,500 per child in vouchers to move them from failing D.C. schools into private or parochial schools (where their reading scores beat their public school counterparts). Don’t count on Gibbs and Obama’s journalistic cheerleaders to tell you that Obama will cave and allow similar forms of rationing to please the teachers’ unions and that 38 percent of members of Congress have their children in private schools.

Rationing oil exploration, the use of fossil fuels and nuclear energy (in favor of expensive “alternatives” such as ethanol) as well as the rationing of carbon emissions in a “cap-and-trade” program are all elements of Obama’s “green” agenda. Of course the government, which has “bailed out” automakers, is also pressuring them to “ration” the production of cars that don’t meet Obama’s “green” standards. The net effect will be to ration consumer choices and also to impose the largest tax increase (on energy) in American history.

Regarding national defense, Obama’s most ambitious rationing proposal is his call for a worldwide elimination of nuclear weapons. So far, Russia, North Korea, Iran, Al Qaeda and others threatening the United States have shown no inclination to follow Obama’s lead. Will Obama “ration” military spending and efforts against terrorism to the point that the country will be judiciously protected? His first 100 days have raised several questions in that regard.

The one area where Obama has failed to ration is in his massive expansion of government spending, taxation, indebtedness and control. Obama has ignored several opportunities to cut pork projects and other government waste, abuse and corruption.

As President Obama celebrates his first 100 days in office with nary a nod to what he is rationing and what he is failing to ration, consider that he still has 1360 days in office to make either the right or the wrong decisions about rationing.

Since we can’t rely on his press secretary or many in the mainstream media to reveal what’s really happening, it’s important that we don’t ration our vigilance or our outspokenness.

The Far Left

The Perspective:

Longtime conservative leader Morton Blackwell, a Reagan administration alumni and once the youngest Goldwater delegate at the GOP convention, is perhaps best know as the originator of the phrase “Personnel is policy.”

Blackwell’s observation speaks a great truth about American government. Since no one man or woman can do it all, alone, we have followed the French in the development of bureaucratic systems that allow for power and authority to be delegated to subordinates who are responsible, on a daily basis, for the administration of public policy. It is these people, even more than the president, who directly impact the way policies are developed and carried out.

The people chosen to fill positions within an administration, no matter how minor those positions might be, matter; they matter because they are being handed the tools with which to make real decisions that have an effect on the American people, the American economy, our legal system, our national defense and just about any other issue you can name on a day-to-day basis.

Throughout the 2008 presidential campaign, Barack Obama presented himself to the American people as a change-oriented centrist, slightly to the left of the middle of the road. The way he has governed over his first 100 days, however, shows him to be anything but the image he projected, particularly where many of his appointments are concerned. And it is these appointments that will determine the direction of policy in his administration over the next four years.

Some of the names and some of the circumstances are already familiar. Obama may have a Cabinet that, to borrow a phrase from Bill Clinton, “looks like America.” But they certainly don’t pay taxes like the rest of us. Several of his most high level appointees, chief among them Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner, have been exposed as having failed to pay the taxes they owed at the time these should have paid them.

Then there is Attorney General Eric Holder, who prior to his appointment may have been best known for helping fugitive financier Marc Rich obtain a pardon in the waning days of the Clinton administration. Since coming into office, however, he shocked the nation when, during a presentation to mark Black History month, he called America a “nation of cowards” on the issue of race. Writer Joe Klein, who is generally sympathetic to the liberal point of view, denounced Holder for his remarks, saying they provided “absolutely no acknowledgement of the incredible progress that has been made over the last 40 or 50 years.”

Janet Napolitano, who leads the Department of Homeland Security, similarly came under fire after her department released a report on so-called rise of right-wing extremism in America that lumped returning veterans and anti-abortion activists into the same group as white power organizations and Timothy McVeigh, who helped mastermind the 1995 bombing of the Murrah federal building in Oklahoma City. Embarrassed, she met with veterans groups in Washington on Friday and gave what an American Legion representative characterized as a “heartfelt” apology.

But it’s not just the apples at the top of the barrel that are reason to be suspicious that a leftward drift is underway. There are plenty of secondary appointments, not all of which are subject to the Senate’s advice and consent, which make up the new administration’s gallery of liberal rogues.

White House Science Advisor Dr. John P. Holdren is a noted alarmist where the idea of global catastrophes is concerned. In 1971, he predicted that “some form of eco-catastrophe, if not thermonuclear war, seems almost certain to overtake us before the end of the century.” That same year Holdren also claimed that “population control, the redirection of technology, the transition from open to closed resource cycles, the equitable distribution of opportunity, and the ingredients of prosperity must all be accomplished if there is to be a future worth living.”

More recently, in 2006, Holdren suggested that global sea levels could rise by 13 feet by the end of this century. The 2007 Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change’s Fourth Assessment Report suggests a potential sea level rise of just 13 inches.

Another Obama appointee clearly outside the mainstream of American thought and values is Harold Koh, the Yale Law School dean whom Obama tapped be the State Department’s legal adviser.

Koh is, as columnist Andy McCarthy has written, “a radical trans-nationalist.” His view is that the United States is not, in essence, an independent nation with a natural right to govern its own national security. Rather Koh’s view is this country should be governed by a “trans-national jurisprudence” that “assumes America’s political and economic interdependence with other nations operating within the international legal system.” In Koh’s world, U.S. law should be subordinate to some kind of international code.

Then there is Rosa Brooks, who has been tapped to be a key adviser to the undersecretary of defense for policy. A former columnist with The Los Angeles Times, Brooks once compared the work product of Bush’s Office of Legal Counsel to “the so-called Big Lie theory of political propaganda, articulated most infamously by Adolf Hitler.” In 2007, according to various sources, she characterized Al Qaeda as “little more than an obscure group of extremist thugs, well financed and intermittently lethal but relatively limited in their global and regional political pull.” And she once wrote “George W. Bush and Dick Cheney shouldn’t be treated like criminals who deserve punishment. They should be treated like psychotics who need treatment…. Because they’ve clearly gone mad.”

Hardly the calm, rational and reasoned approach one has every right to expect from a senior Pentagon adviser.

Almost everywhere you look in the Obama administration you can find appointees whose beliefs are clearly outside the mainstream, who are, in a word, extremists. David Ogden, the nominee for the No. 2 job at the U.S. Department of Justice, who, according to FOXNews.com once filed a brief on behalf of a group of library directors arguing against the Children’s Internet Protection Act. The act ordered libraries and schools receiving funding for the Internet to restrict access to obscene sites. But Ogden’s brief argued that the act impaired the ability of librarians to do their jobs. He called it “unconstitutional,” though the Supreme Court later disagreed with him and upheld the act.” He also “argued, on behalf of several media groups, against a child pornography law that required publishers of all kinds to verify and document the age of their models (which would ensure the models are at least 18). The provisions were struck down. — Ogden was quoted at the time saying the potential reach of the law was ‘mind-boggling’ and even ‘terrifying.’”

And then there’s Dawn Johnson, who was nominated to be assistant attorney general and head of DOJ’s Office of Legal Counsel, who has written that “abortion restrictions reduce pregnant women to no more than fetal containers” and who has opposed the U.S. Supreme Court’s decision to uphold a ban on partial birth abortion.

Rather than an administration of centrists, the Obama presidency is shaping up to be one in which the dominant voice is that of the American far-left. Right before our eyes, based on the appointments thus far, we are seeing “Changing we can believe in” being transformed into “Change we can’t believe.”

First 100 Days: No Money Left Barry

The Perspective:

We were in a fiscal hole when President Obama came into office and for 100 days he’s been digging it deeper and deeper. The numbers involved are astonishing and power is being concentrated in the hands of Washington insiders to an unprecedented degree. What it adds up to is an unprecedented expansion in the size, scope, and intrusiveness of the federal government and a suffocating burden of debt.

When Obama took office the deficit for 2009 (assuming current projections for receipts and economic activity) amounted to 9.7 percent of the U.S. economy. Obama has already grown that to 11.9 percent with the stimulus and omnibus. The proposals in his new budget will take it to an astonishing 12.9 percent.

The bailout tab went from a shocking $7.7 trillion under Bush to an utterly incomprehensible $12.8 trillion in just 100 days. A trillion is tough concept to understand. This might help: A million seconds is 12 days. A billion seconds is 31 years. A trillion seconds is 31,688 years. What does $12 trillion look like? This video might help.

The bailouts are just the beginning. Decisions that used to be made by ordinary Americans living their lives, going to work, and spending time with their families will instead be made by big government bureaucrats. People who played by the rules, took care of their families, and paid their taxes are going to pick up the tab for special interests on Wall Street and in Washington.

The tea parties showed that ordinary Americans understand what’s happening a lot better than media and political elites would like. Ordinary Americans are called stupid or ignorant when they worry that they’ll be forced to pay for trillions of dollars in new spending. Taxes will only be increased on the top 5 percent, President Obama says. But there is simply not enough money there to pay for this unprecedented spending spree. Middle class Americans know that Obama will eventually have to reach into their pockets — through taxes, inflation, or a combination of both — for the same reason Willie Sutton robbed banks: that’s where the money is.

The big-government power-grab shows no signs of slowing down. A government health care takeover, a massive energy tax, a federal education power-grab, and sweeping increases in federal power in every area of economic life are staring us in the face.

Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, and Harry Reid call this “progress” and call themselves “progressives.” But the idea of centralized control, of enlightened bureaucrats or royalty dictating to people how to live their lives is one of the oldest, least progressive ideas in the world. It looks more like 13^th century feudalism than anything innovative, new, or forward-looking.

The really progressive idea is human freedom, allowing individuals to own the rewards of hard-work and risk-taking when it works and to suffer to consequences of failure and to learn from them. A free society requires a government that sets the basic ground rules, assures contracts are enforced, maintains public safety, and prevents and punishes force and fraud. Forays into central economic planning or regulating people’s private lives never turn out well.

The lesson of the 20^th century should have been that free markets work and central planning is a disaster. Unfortunately, it looks like we may need to learn that lesson one more time the hard way before we’ll fully understand it.

How To Save The United States Automakers

The Perspective:

In the wake of news that General Motors is on an expedited path to bankruptcy and that Chrysler will pair up with Italian automaker Fiat, things are not looking up for the American auto industry. While the credit crunch and the ongoing recession have played a significant role in reaching this point, frankly much of the blame rests with policy makers in Washington, D.C.

The shibboleth that the plight of the Big Three (Ford, Chrysler and GM) is simply a function of their terrible product line is tired, worn out, and in most respects simply untrue. Actually government industrial policy has been more harmful to the American automobile industry than any of the decisions of the auto industry management. And now that the industry is on a rendezvous with destruction, perhaps we ought to make a change before it’s too late.

Here are 3 policy shifts that will restore life and vitality to the automakers each of which ought to be considered immediately and certainly before any more taxpayer bailouts are considered.

1. Adopt a 3 Year Moratorium on UAW (United Auto Worker) Union Representation and Immediately Suspend the Existing UAW Union Contract.

The federal government policy of authorizing and enabling an all too powerful union to represent employees of all of the American automakers has been a costly mistake. Using the protections of law and possessing little interest in the ongoing concerns of the host corporations, the UAW has acted like a predator going after any or all of their targets when they were most vulnerable.

And this strategy has paid off handsomely for the unions, but there’s been little to no return for the automakers or the car buying consumer. The UAW contracts run over a thousand pages in detail and all focus on extracting and maintaining medical, pension, and retiree obligations that are now nearly $30 billion for GM alone. These costs make GM and Chrysler uncompetitive and were never sustainable, and now having overwhelmed the automakers they’ll be passed along to the American taxpayer if we don’t act soon.

Today as most Americans sit at their kitchen table deciding on cost cutting measures that will allow them to keep their houses and their families intact, the UAW continues to hold out hope that it can keep its excessive gains that its maintained over the last 30 years. Since the UAW can’t act responsibly their contract should be suspended and a 3 year moratorium should be put in place to give the American auto industry the running room necessary to survive and thrive without needing further taxpayer bailouts.

2. Let the Market Decide the Automotive Product Line, Not Environmentalists and Washington, D.C. Bureaucrats.

In the midst of plunging auto sales which set new records lows each month it is essential that the automakers be unleashed from rules that require them to sell products based on the desires of powerful eco-interests groups instead of those of the buying public.

A key failure of Washington policymakers over the last 30 years has been its view that Washington knew better what products the Big Three should bring to market than the companies themselves. After spending nearly $25 billion of taxpayer dollars to keep Chrysler and GM operational, its high time we revisit this attitude.

It simply isn’t true that federal policy requiring ever greater fuel efficiency and emissions reductions line up with the interests of the buying public. One glaring fact is that for the last 15 years the single best selling vehicle in the U.S. has been that paragon of fuel efficiency, the American pick-up truck. Yet Washington still insists that automakers must focus ever greater efforts on selling smaller, lighter “enviro” friendly autos?

Derided as “automotive birth control” by car aficionados these fuel efficient vehicles have been seen by the auto buying public (particularly in the exurbs) as unattractive, unsafe, slow and incapable of meeting the basic transportation needs of working families. Notably every Toyota Prius, the icon of fuel efficiency, is sold at a loss. In other words the other cars Toyota sells subsidize the cost of making the Prius available to the public. Even when gasoline was over $4 a gallon Toyota can’t profitably sell the Prius. On the other hand pick-up trucks, SUVs and sports cars are much more profitable to make than hybrids and they outsell the hybrids by nearly 10 to 1.

Continuing mandates that ever greater percentages of the new vehicles manufactured must be either hybrids and/or emissions free vehicles can only be considered what economists call the “the Triumph of Hope over Experience.” This mindset is damaging to the auto industry and to the taxpayer. Rather than continue forcing the taxpayers to bear the operational costs of the American automakers as they are forced to sale products that the buying public eschews, we should temporarily repeal these mandates and allow the automakers to sell as many of their most profitable cars as the public wants. Especially in a plunging market it is more important than ever to let the market dictate sales not Washington, D.C. and green activists.

3. Instead of having U.S. government backed warranties, we should lower the costs of servicing and maintenance of all vehicles.

The so called “Motor Vehicle Owners’ Right to Repair” should be enacted to require that both dealer and non-dealer repair shops can provide automobile repair service. President Obama’s decision to put the federal government in the business of “backing” the warranties of American automakers is exactly the wrong policy. It perpetuates a monopolistic practice and shifts the burden of keeping the automakers operational to all taxpayers (even those who can’t afford to buy a new car) all the while doing nothing to encourage potential customers concerned about repair and servicing costs.

Because new cars and trucks are increasingly sophisticated virtually every aspect of the vehicle is either monitored or controlled by computers. The upside is that these vehicles are far more efficient, environmentally friendly and reliable than ever before (even without the government mandates).

But the systems necessary to keep them in safe and efficient working condition requires access to complete and accurate repair information from the car companies. The auto industry has refused to make this information available outside of their dealer network even on a fee basis. Notably the cost of dealer service is a major hindrance to auto buying even for late model used cars (which are increasingly just as sophisticated as new vehicles) and this is especially true during this recession.

The costs to car owners when they have their vehicle repaired at the dealership is estimated to be as much as 25 percent higher with labor charges alone, according to a study comparing dealer repair tags compared with those of an independent service center. And the problem is worse for those who live in rural areas as the added cost of gas and travel time to the nearest dealership is an added burden.

There is no safety issue involved here - in fact just the opposite. Some newer vehicles are not getting properly serviced at all as job layoffs and recession worries cause them to delay or put off altogether a costly dealer servicing visit. While this monopolistic practice might have been overlooked during a boom time now that the taxpayers are subsidizing the automobile industry this practice must come to an end.

In conclusion, in essential respects US policy towards the automakers is shortsighted and in most respects unlikely to accomplish any other objective than saddling the taxpayers with ever greater levels of debt. Each of these three solutions focus on returning the American automakers back to profitability by doing what they do best - selling the types of automotive products that consumers want without unneeded mandates and monopolistic interventions.

After dismal car and truck sales in 2008, and with demand off more than 33 percent in the first three months of this year already unless we want to see the ultimate demise of the auto industry major industrial policy changes are in order.

The Tyrants Are Watching Barry Obama

The Perspective: Perhaps the major reason it has been 200 years since pirates dared challenge the United States of America on the high seas was the decisive action taken by Thomas Jefferson (the first Democrat) against them. Jefferson dispatched the schooner USS Enterprise in 1801 to the same Barbary Coast where today’s Somali (and as back then) Islamic pirates demanded financial tribute from the United States. The U.S. Navy soundly defeated the pirates.

Two years later the pirates were back for more. This time, they captured the USS Philadelphia along with its captain, William Bainbridge, the officers and crew and held them hostage. On the night of Feb. 16, 1804, Lt. Stephen Decatur, Jr. led a small band of the first American Marines. The Marines commandeered a Tripolitan ketch, which they re-christened USS Intrepid, to deceive the guards on board the Philadelphia and get close enough to the ship to storm the vessel. With support from American ships, the Marines set fire to the Philadelphia, preventing her use by the pirates and went on to capture the city of Tripoli. This is where the line came from in the Marine H ymn about “the shores of Tripoli”.

So far, the reaction by modern Democrats has been less than inspiring. Senate Foreign Relations Committee Chairman John Kerry has threatened to hold hearings! That should strike fear into the hearts of the pirates. What will the Obama administration do if the pirates are captured alive? He won’t sent them to Gitmo, which he is closing down. Will they get ACLU lawyers? Will there be testimony from a “pirates rights” group? Will they be released on a technicality after a trial in U.S. courts? If there is not as forceful a response as there was during the Jefferson administration, it will invite more of these incidents. The world’s tyrants are watching to see how President Obama reacts. The message they get will determine how they respond to America and whether we will be in greater peril.

Amnesty=Bullshit.

The Perspective: It's all about taxes.

The New York Times reports this morning that President Obama intends to make immigration “reform” a priority this year. The Times quotes Cecilia Muñoz, deputy assistant to the president and director of intergovernmental affairs in the White House, calling for “policy reform that controls immigration and makes it an orderly system.”

Translating through the policy speak, Ms. Munoz is calling for amnesty. But what she is not calling for is any sort of fence, to secure the U.S.-Mexican border. Amnesty + No Fence is a formula for disaster.

But that’s the liberal Democratic agenda (shared by some Republicans, unfortunately), and it must be stopped. Open border advocates and some in Congress are urging Obama to stop construction of the 670 mile fence along the Mexican border.

Others are are even pushing for the fence to be completely dismantled, ignoring the will of the American people who overwhelmingly rejected the McCain-Kennedy amnesty plan in 2007 and instead supported border security.

During the recent presidential elections, the illegal immigration crisis was downplayed by both major party presidential candidates and virtually ignored by the elite media and pundits in New York and Washington. That was good news for Obama, who supported amnesty in 2007, but it was bad news for John McCain, who never could see that border security was a potential game-changer for him.

Many “Washington political experts” stated that illegal immigration was no longer an issue. But according to a recent Rasmussen Reports national survey, most Americans support the continued construction of a fence along the U.S.-Mexico border and the use of the military, if necessary, in border areas.

The pro-open border, anti-fence activists are now emboldened because former Arizona Governor Janet Napolitano, the new Secretary of Homeland Security, is perceived to be one of them and may try to halt or further delay construction of the much-needed barrier.

The issue of border security is all the more important at a time when Mexico is in crisis. Some 5,700 deaths last year in Mexico were blamed on drug violence–is now the time to make it easier to cross the border?

In addition, America is now plunging into what could be a deep and protracted recession. With unemployment on the rise, American workers need the work, and the United States government can no longer afford the economic costs associated with illegal immigration.

The Obama administration should complete the fence and secure our borders. The legal status of those here illegally should wait–although, of course, all Americans should obey the law, and nobody should be here illegally.

If Obama won’t fulfill his sworn duty to defend the nation, and to protect the American people, then he should be held to account, by peaceful political action.

And that calling to account will happen, starting with the 2009 elections, in Virginia and New Jersey.

Budget Tricks

The Perspective:

Congressional Democrats reacted to the shocking scope of President Obama’s plan to spend $3.6 trillion next year in his budget (and a stunning $42.2 trillion over ten years) the way Washington insiders usually do — they turned to tricks and gimmicks. They “trimmed” his budget and got it down to $3.0 trillion for next year and about $15 trillion over five years without actually cutting any spending. Strip off the gimmicks, however, and the Congressional budgets still look almost exactly like the president’s budget.

Here are the top 5 tricks they used to do it:

5. Hiding Years 6 Through 10

President Obama criticized Bush for not following the practice of the Clinton years of doing 10-year budgeting, opting instead for shorter 5-year budgets. The White House made the case that showing longer-term obligations was important given the enormity of the country’s fiscal challenges. Congressional Democrats, however, decided that the quickest and easiest way to conceal a huge portion of the Obama budget from the public was to simply shorten it to 5 years, hiding some of the biggest big ticket items in the secret second 5 years.

4. A Hidden Wall Street Bailout

President Obama included $250 billion in additional Wall Street bailouts in his budget (a bit of a budget trick in itself — since it assumes that $750 billion in assets would be purchased that could later be sold for $500 billion). Both the House and Senate budget resolutions failed to show any funding for the almost certain new rounds of Wall Street bailouts, despite the fact that Treasury Secretary Geithner has already announced an expanded plan, and the Washington-Wall Street bailout machine shows no signs of slowing down. Future bailouts could cost hundreds of billions or trillions of dollars, making a budget that fails to include them an extreme low-ball.

3. Hidden Tax Hikes

The Senate and House both pretend that the Making Work Pay tax credit — Obama’s big campaign promise, originally a $500 per worker credit that’s since been trimmed to $400 — will expire after 2010 (House) or 2012 (Senate). Obama would pay for those so-called tax cuts (more than 42 percent, according to the White House which would take the form of checks to non-income tax payers) through revenues from his cap-and-trade energy tax.

Cap-and-trade is included in the Congressional budgets but there is no word about how high the tax hike would be. In fact, the Congressional budgets claim, unbelievably, that this tax would be “revenue-neutral.” Congress also pretends that the Alternative Minimum Tax will be allowed to slam the middle class, providing only for a 1-year fix, despite the White House insistence that there be a permanent reform. Even the 1-year cost, though, is hidden from the deficit total through a reserve fund.

2. Secret Reserve Funds

Speaking of reserve funds, lots of them are being used to hide a wide variety of tax hikes and policy changes that would substantially change the overall budget numbers — making them look like the original Obama budget — it they were properly accounted for. The House has 17 reserve funds and the Senate 15, most of which claim to be deficit-neutral without any explanation of how substantial tax cuts and spending increases could be done in a deficit-neutral fashion without big tax hikes. One reserve fund that does have an associated funding level is the Medicare reserve fund that would increase mandatory spending $285 billion over 10 years-on top of the reported total numbers for spending and deficits. These reserve funds serve no purpose other than to avoid accountability and transparency, and make the budget look a lot smaller than it really is.

1. Using the Reconciliation Trick for Health Care

This is by far the worst and most dangerous trick in the budget. The cap-and-trade energy tax could potentially be forced through Congress in budget reconciliation, a trick to avoid proper debate and the normal 60 vote requirement for important legislation. Fortunately, last week Sen. Mike Johanns of Nebraska introduced a budget amendment to prohibit the use of reconciliation for cap-and-trade, and it passed on a solid 67-31 vote. Every Republican supported the amendment, as did 26 Democrats. Unfortunately, Democrats are still poised to pull the same reconciliation trick for their plan to nationalize and ration health care.

While the Senate passed a budget resolution without reconciliation language, the House budget specifically includes a section authorizing the use of reconciliation for a national health care plan. This is despite the fact that reconciliation only matters in the Senate, where it can short-circuit debate and pass legislation with only 50 votes instead of the regular sixty. This sets up a conference committee where Senate reconciliation instructions can be inserted and railroaded through, despite the fact that the Senate already rejected this approach.

The country deserves an honest, public discussion of where we’re going on issues like health care, energy, taxes, and spending. Unfortunately we have a Congress whose budget is a big bag of tricks and gimmicks to hide its true cost and to slip major policy changes in through the back door.

The "Reckless Generation"

The Perspective:

Our parents and grandparents were part of what has been recognized as the “Greatest Generation.” With sheer grit and unflinching will they conquered fascism, saved freedom, and put America on course to a level of prosperity never before seen. Through their efforts, they left us a legacy that even centuries from now, history will regard with awe.

But, if we are not careful, the legacy of our generation will be very different. If we follow the course set forth in Washington by Democrats’ stunning budget proposal, we will shirk our responsibilities to our children and grandchildren, burying our nation in an avalanche of debt.

The Democrats’ budget proposal will double the national debt in five years and triple it in ten! Our nation’s debt will increase to more than 82% of our nation’s entire GDP by the last year of the budget. We are talking year after year of record spending, record taxes, and record deficits.

When Americans are feeling the squeeze of a painful recession and tightening their belts, this budget will squeeze them even tighter -– and it will take from, instead of providing for, generations to come.

It’s time to stop mortgaging our children’s future and time to start building them a better tomorrow. We cannot let history record that we were the “Reckless Generation.”

The expansion of the federal government in this budget is shocking. Call your representatives in Congress today, and tell them to vote against this massive increase in spending and debt and put America on the road to recovery –- not bankruptcy.

Let me make it easy for you. Here’s the number for the Congressional switchboard: (202) 224-3121

Not what I promised, still adding the finishing touches to that segment, you should get it by Sunday.

Mr. Obama WHAT ABOUT FORD?

The Perspective:

Drastic times call for drastic measures.

With billions of TARP dollars being tossed to GM, interim CEO Fritz Henderson today said that they need to change big and change fast. My guess is that they will cut brands and "lines" (models within the brand). I would recommend that they keep Cadillac and Chevrolet and let the rest go to the junkyard in the sky. Bye, see ya later, alligator, sayonara... You cannot compete with so many different makes and models. The bailed-out auto maker should focus its marketing dollars and design talent toward the two relatively successful brands already within GM domestic.

Chrysler is majority owned by Cerberus Capital, a hedge fund. It still infuriates me that a hedge fund is the ultimate beneficiary of my tax dollars. Cerberus, for those who have forgotten, bought Chrysler in a move of financial bravado. They overpaid massively, but justified it by claiming Chrysler was an American brand that would thrive. Thrive it did not -- and now our tax dollars are bailing out a hedge-fund bet gone bad.

What has been lost in all this? The fate of the one U.S. car manufacturer that has done things right: Ford. With billions of dollars of free money being thrown at GM and Chrysler, Ford has been placed at a competitive disadvantage. While Ford is still paying high fees to service its debt the old fashion way, its major competitors GM and Chrysler are receiving free cash to shore up their businesses.

Think of it as a neighborhood where homeowner Ford is making its high-rate mortgage payments on time while you and me are paying for neighbors GM’s and Chrysler’s mortgages. Ridiculous, isn't it?

Where are you, Obama administration? Why aren't you pointing out that Ford is doing things right? Why aren't you arranging deals for Ford internationally?

Will you join me to promote Ford as the one U.S. auto corporation that is actually doing things right ...

Tomorrow, another short one, but one that will open your mind...

Here's To A One Term President Obama

The Perspective:

On Monday, the president of the United States, a man who never had to meet a payroll in his life, fired the chief executive officer of General Motors. Obama did so because he didn’t like General Motors’ reorganization plan–it was reportedly not tough enough on the bondholders. In Old America, GM would have gone into bankruptcy and been forced to sit down with bondholders, shareholders, unions and other creditors and worked it out. But no more. Obama, having failed to deliver on card checks to his union constituency, wasn’t about to let established bankruptcy procedure resolve the problem possibly at the expense of unions.

Welcome to the New America.

What should we call this place? Lately, on the right, and in various Tea Parties held across the country, the word “socialism” has cropped up. But this doesn’t quite fit.

New America: Authoritarian.

New America’s Managerial State has not been that programmatic. There’s no wholesale nationalization or expropriation. Instead, these statist elites seem to be operating more episodically, accumulating power in increments large and small, and here and there — to what cumulative end none can say.

But it’s not too early to label what to call this New America: Authoritarian. At the moment, it’s a mild authoritarianism, not too burdensome, more conceptual than actual.

Sound too paranoid? Perhaps. But consider some recent troubling events. Congress passes a 400 page, $780 billion dollar budget without bothering to read it! – If this happened in a country called Nicamala, we’d smile and call it a “rubber stamp” legislature; then, when President Obama gets caught including AIG bonuses in that budget — an tax subsidized organization with suspiciously close ties to the president’s resume and campaign — he helps deflect attention by sponsoring menacing visits to the homes of AIG executives. Meanwhile, paid political hacks and presidential surrogates are sent forth to attack radio talk show hosts, TV stock gurus, all the while whispering “Fairness Doctrine.” If this happened in a country called Venezil, we’d call it political thuggery and figure that one can’t expect any better from banana republics. Obamistas?

Meanwhile, the private sector is breathlessly hyper-focused on Washington rather than building a better mousetrap. The irony of all this is that owing to voters’ bad judgment and stupidity (yes, I’ll be among the first to publicly say it), we’ve elected a man to find us jobs who has never had a real job and a guy with no corporate experience to straighten out our largest companies.

As Howard Dirksen says, there are reasons why state governments don’t let 11-year-olds drive cars. There are also reasons why Americans have generally not elected neophytes to high office. But to paraphrase another old saying, if you’re having bad presidency, make it a short one.

Here’s to a one-term President Obama.

Tomorrow I have a short one on FORD.

Mr. Obama Goes To War...

The Perspective:

Sixty days into his presidency, it’s official: President Barack Hussein Obama now owns the war in Afghanistan and has expanded it to Pakistan. And not a minute too soon.

As the president was unveiling his new strategy to “disrupt, dismantle and defeat al Qaeda” and its allies, Pakistanis were cleaning up the debris of a suicide bomber’s latest attack in northern Pakistan – an explosion inside a mosque, of all places, which killed 48 Muslims and wounded dozens more. Meanwhile, key Taliban leaders in Afghanistan and Pakistan were distributing an agreement to bury their differences in order to counter the new American-led offensive “for the sake of God, God’s happiness, and the strength of religion.”

Here’s what has changed, and what hasn’t, in the strategy that Mr. Obama and his key aides unveiled today:

First, the president’s policy is a “surge” of forces, though he studiously avoided using that word for fear of paying any tribute to what former President George Bush learned and accomplished, albeit belatedly, in Iraq. The addition of 4,000 more troops to the 17,000 the president has already committed will bring the number of combat, training, and support troops on the Afghan ground from the 31,000 deployed at the end of Mr. Bush’s term in December, 2008 to some 68,000 by this fall, senior military officials say. So those who have urged Mr. Obama to reduce America’s commitment to the Af-Pak conflict are likely to be disappointed. Indeed, Senator Carl Levin, Democrat of Michigan, lost little time today in criticizing the strategy.

Second, Mr. Obama is adding hundreds more civilians to the effort to encourage Afghanistan’s development and internal stability and is tripling development aid to Pakistan. This “surge” of civilian forces and resources means that President Obama eschewed the advice of those in his inner circle – among them, Vice President Biden and adviser Jim Steinberg – who reportedly lobbied for downsizing our efforts and adopting a narrower counter-terrorism strategy that would have enabled Washington to build and train the Afghan army and police, declare victory and leave. President Obama’s announcement, followed by a briefing by three key advisors at the White House, suggests that the president has opted for the broader strategy favored by Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Afghan special Af-Pak envoy Richard Holbrooke, and CENTCOM chief General David Petraeus. The goal of that more ambitious strategy is, in Mr. Obama’s words, to enhance the “military, governance, and economic capacity of Afghanistan and Pakistan.”

In remarks after the president spoke, Bruce Riedel, an author of the new Af-Pak strategy, specifically rejected the term “nation-building” to describe what the Obama Administration will do in Af-Pak. But his description of the road ahead sounds an awful lot like, well, nation building. “There are 396 districts in Afghanistan. There’s been no training at that level; There are lots of things like that we can do,” he said.

The aides also stressed Washington’s desire to help Afghanistan improve its embattled agricultural sector, hit hard by war and competition from the more lucrative poppy crops in southern Afghanistan, largely controlled by the Taliban. America and its NATO allies will also step up efforts to train more police, help protect judges, and stand up for courts at the district and provincial levels. Richard Holbrooke focused on the need to strengthen the psychological and communications aspects of the Af-Pak war. Washington, he said, would not repeat its mistake of ignoring the 150 illegal FM radio stations and the Taliban’s nightly broadcasts of “names of people they’re going to behead or they’ve beheaded.”

Make no mistake: this is an ambitious agenda.

Third, despite Mr. Obama’s call for a trilateral “dialogue” with Afghanistan and Pakistan, President Obama seems committed to continuing, and even increasing, the Predator attacks on Al Qaeda safe havens in Pakistan that have already killed an estimated 9 of the top 20 Al Qaeda leaders. Although the president only alluded to the strikes in his remarks, Michelle Flournoy, his number three at the Pentagon, said that the “counterterrorism piece” of the Af-Pak strategy would remain “a central part of this mission,.” Indeed, she added, “I certainly believe we are going to be increasing our intelligence focus in this theater, and as opportunities arise that may increase the pace of operations, as well.”

How different is the strategy announced today from what candidate Obama promised or for that matter, what leading Republicans have pressed for? Not very different, say some Washington insiders. Max Boot, a conservative analyst at the Council on Foreign Relations, concluded that President Obama’s strategy was “pretty much all that supporters of the war effort could have asked for, and probably pretty similar to what a President McCain would have decided on.”

James S. Robbins, a former Pentagon official with the American Foreign Policy Council in Washington, noted that the Obama strategy was remarkably similar to what former President Bush had proposed in 2004. The Bush strategy had “five pillars” that strongly resembled those outlined by Mr. Obama today: defeat terrorism, help build and strengthen the Afghan security structure, help Afghanistan“clear and hold” territory, promote reconstruction and good governance, and engage regional states in ensuring Afghanistan’s success.

But President Bush’s war of choice in Iraq sapped priority and resources from the war of necessity in Afghanistan. President Obama now intends to reverse that flow and also to place greater priority on stabilizing Pakistan, without which Afghan security is a non-starter.

Whether President Obama succeeds will depend on how he implements his strategy. And implementation is still a work in process, his aides acknowledge. Team Obama also chose not to clarify how they will reconcile the sometimes contradictory goals Obama endorsed with the realities of the region. For instance, how will they reconcile their determination to work closely with Pakistan with their knowledge that elements in the Pakistani security services are aiding and abetting the Taliban inside Afghanistan?

They also said little about the specific “benchmarks” they would adopt for measuring progress in this war. How will they measure, say, a decline in Afghan corruption? The President’s strategy, says Mr. Riedel, is a “road map for moving forward,” not a “campaign plan” or a “straightjacket.”

Giving your administration diplomatic and military wiggle room is almost always wise. But by making the defeat of Al-Qaeda and its allies in Afghanistan and Pakistan a key foreign policy objective, President Obama has now given the nation a benchmark for measuring him, his staying power, and the effectiveness of his foreign policy.

The Insane Obama Budget

The Perspective:

At his press conference last night, President Obama insisted once again that he inherited the budget deficit, and “we’re doing everything we can to reduce that deficit.”

But the deficits over the next 10 years that Obama proposed in his budget are not George Bush’s deficits. They are the deficits that Obama has proposed, resulting from the $1 trillion in increased spending he adopted in the no-stimulus stimulus bill, and the $400 billion supplemental spending bill he supported and also adopted the following week, and the $275 billion housing bailout he proposed the next week, and the $1 trillion bank bailout plan his Treasury Secretary just proposed this week, and the $638 billion he has proposed as a “downpayment” on a new national health insurance entitlement. The health insurance plan will be the most expensive entitlement of all — serious estimates are that it will cost at least $1.2 trillion or more. Does this sound like he is “doing everything we can to reduce that deficit?”

Under the Obama budget, the Congressional Budget Office (CBO) projects that the national debt will more than double over the next 10 years from 40% of GDP today to a shocking 82%! Ronald Reagan left office with the national debt at 42% of GDP. At the end of World War II, the national debt was just under 114% of GDP. If the economy does not recover permanently next year, as even the Congressional Budget Office (now controlled entirely by Democrats) assumes, Obama could even top that World War II record — spending mostly on welfare and entitlements rather than on fighting the Nazis and Imperial Japan.

Does this sound like we’re “moving from an era of borrow-and-spend to one where we save and invest,” as Obama also said last night?

In fact, there is not one item in Obama’s budget that promotes actual saving and investment. Quite to the contrary, the tax rate increases he proposes for the top income tax brackets, for capital gains, and for dividends will all reduce saving and investment.

The budget Obama proposes for this year increases federal spending by a fiscally insane 34% over the budget adopted for last year, with a total of $4 trillion in federal spending, the highest ever. That spending would equal 28.5% of GDP, an increase in the size of the federal government in Obama’s first year of 42% compared to the postwar average relative to GDP.

The deficit would reach a $1.845 trillion this year, according to the CBO — the highest ever except for World War II. That would be more than 4 times Reagan’s largest deficit, which caused so much howling among liberals and Democrats.

The CBO further estimates that this Obama budget deficit will total an astounding 13.1% of GDP, more than one-eighth of the entire U.S. economy, for the federal deficit alone! That is again the largest in U.S. history except for World War II and more than twice Reagan’s highest deficit as a percent of GDP.

Reagan adopted budget cuts soon after he entered office equal to close to 5% of the federal budget at the time. Even with his defense buildup — which won the Cold War without firing a shot — total federal spending declined from a high of 23.5% of GDP in 1983 to 21.3% in 1988 and 21.2% in 1989. That’s a real reduction in the size of government relative to the economy of 10%.

Obama last night also taunted Republican critics of his budget, saying, “we haven’t seen an alternative budget out of them.” But next week when Congress starts debating the budget, Rep. Paul Ryan (R-Wis.), the ranking Republican on the House Budget Committee, will present precisely such an alternative budget. Then we will see what we could have had if we hadn’t elected left-wing extremists to the White House and to run the Congress.

Watch What You Say Mr. Obama

The Perspective: It's Back....

Now that President Obama has taken the “Harry Truman pledge” about the economy by saying “The buck stops with me,” it also seems appropriate for him to take the “Colin Powell pledge” by acknowledging of himself, “Once you break it, you are going to own it.”

The first quote is a paraphrase of the sign on former President Truman’s desk reading, “The buck stops here” and the second is what former Secretary of State Powell says he told President Bush in 2002 about the danger of invading Iraq. Powell told The Atlantic magazine:

…what I did say was…once you break it, you are going to own it, and we’re going to be responsible for 26 million people standing there looking at us…And it’s going to take all the oxygen out of the political environment …

The real problem with Obama and the sentiments expressed in the two quotes above is that while the president would pay a political price by failing to turn around the economy, the buck actually stops with taxpayers and if the economy becomes even more broken we, the taxpayers, will own the consequences.

The total tab for taxpayers is already mind-boggling. So far, it includes the $410-billion omnibus spending bill (with more than 8,500 earmarks) that Obama signed on March 11. Then there’s the $787-billion economic stimulus bill which passed with no Republican support in the House and only three Republican votes in the Senate. On Friday, the Congressional Budget Office predicted that the president’s proposed budget would produce a $9.3-trillion deficit during the period from 2010-19. That’s $2.3 trillion worse than the White House predicted in its budget and, if accurate, would make the deficit unsustainable, according to the president’s own budget director!

Further raising the stakes is a new program announced on Monday by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner that would partner the Federal Reserve, the Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and the Treasury Department with private investors to buy from banks at a discount up to $1 trillion in deeply distressed (aka “toxic”) assets—mostly from soured mortgage loans—with the goal of finally properly pricing the assets and then, hopefully, selling them at a profit in the future. Hopefully.

According to The Wall Street Journal this past weekend:

“To encourage investors to buy those assets, the U.S. government will offer lucrative subsidies and shoulder much of the risk.”

That risk and other unknowns in all of this are staggering. Not since the Great Depression have we bet “the house”— “the house” being the economy—to this extent.

Both the danger and the opportunity of the situation take on additional meaning when you look into the origin of Truman’s phrase. “The buck stops here” derives from the expression “pass the buck.” In frontier days, during poker games, a knife with a buckhorn handle was placed in front of the person meant to deal next and if they didn’t want to, they “passed the buck.”

We’ve let Obama do the dealing and the stack of chips he’s gambling with is huge. — After all it’s our money and our nest eggs! The president could bankrupt our country (as New Hampshire Republican Senator Judd Gregg warned recently) or his plans could help it rebound, as Christina Romer, head of the White House Council of Economic Advisors has predicted.

How capable a player is Obama? What does he have in his hand? Does he “know when to hold ‘em and know when to fold ‘em”? Is he truly a poker playing champion or a cocky card sharp? Basically, will he turn out to be safe bet or a terrible risk?

There’s no doubt, if you review the period since his election last November, his moves since becoming president, his most recent book advance and his future earnings as a celebrity, Obama certainly has a talent for getting and using other people’s money. That’s a fist bump for him. But what will it be for us?

New York Times columnist Thomas Friedman claims credit for labeling the idea behind Powell’s as the “Pottery Barn rule” in a February 12, 2003 column and says he also referred to it as the Pottery Barn Rule in speeches. Pottery Barn is a chain of home furnishing stores which denies having a “you break it, you own it” rule, but rather (like many retailers) writes off merchandise broken by customers as a loss.

Perhaps Pottery Barn can afford to write off those losses. Can we? When it comes to the economic crisis and Obama’s other plans in areas including health care, education, energy and the environment, will the president end up being as destructive as “a bull in a china shop” or as nimble as a cat treading quietly through a Pottery Barn store?

Speaking about the AIG bonuses that have caused such an uproar Obama said, “Ultimately, I’m responsible, I’m the president of the United States.” Then he said, “We’ve got a big mess that we’re having to clean up.”

The question is, will Obama clean up the mess or add to it? Our fortunes—in every sense of the word—are riding on the outcome of that gamble.