Welcome one and all to the most intense nightly read on the ‘sphere; Bitsblog’s Nightly Ramble The ‘Politics is Theatre’ edition.
As you might imagine, a lot of my attention has been focused on the plane crash just west of here. But that has been other stuff happening today, that’s worth a mention at least, and here’s some of it:
- What’s the bottom line? In the press, at least, nobody’s been talking about the true cost of this political payoff package that’s being pushed onto the backs of the American people… and their kids… and their grandkids… The Heritage Foundation has, though… and… ready?… The cost for this monster is at least $3.27 TRILLION [1]. That’s assuming we pay the bills on time and don’t defer the debt with more borrowing. And the Economists still say it’s not going to work [2]. My own take is it won’t either. But as I remarked yesterday, the markets are on their way back, and the problem would have solved itself, particularly if the Democrats had done NOTHING. So the timing of this will work out that they’ll be able to claim it was their leadership that ended the recession… Ummmm… assuming that the recession isn’t hyper-extended by the bailouts and political payoffs. Does anyone realy consider that three trillion dollars of debt won’t have a negative effect on the economy? And as for what’s driving this thing; The lobby types had copies of the bill [3] before those voting on it did. So much for Obama’s promise about a lobby free administration… as if that promise wasn’t revealed as a lie two months ago.
- Obama Tries to fill Commerce Sec’y role for a third time: Byron York on why Gregg backed out [4]:
After he looked into it more, he said, ‘Whoa, this was a mistake.'” Plus this: “At the very least, the Census issue would have made for a very uncomfortable confirmation hearing. Gregg’s fellow Republicans on the Senate Commerce, Science and Transportation Committee would certainly have asked him what he thought of a plan that would move control of the Census from professionals in the Commerce Department to Rahm Emanuel, the hyper-partisan White House chief of staff. What would Gregg have said? It was the stimulus problem all over again; Gregg couldn’t have said what he believed, but he probably couldn’t have brought himself to support the president, either.
I can’t recall any president having nearly this much problem trying to fill his cabinet before. Maybe if he simply tried to fill the roles with qualified people instead of playing the political gamesmanship he’s apprently so very fond of… Ohh. and of course, it’d help if he actually picked people of integrity. On the other hand, things are improving, somewhat. After all, Gregg is the first person to withdraw from the cabinet, on something other than his own ethical problems. He’s withdrawing on Obama’s ethica problems, in the end. Rick Moran has more on this stuff. [5]
- It’s who does the counting: Powerline speaks to the Unconstitutional Census takeover [6], which I see as only part of the reason Gregg backed out. Is there anyone who doesn’t understand that we’re going to have ACORN doing census counting? That’s why Obama unconstitutionally took it away from commerce… at the point he made that unconstitutional move, he thought he was going to have a token Republican running Commerce, and thereby running the census. Certainly, Gregg would have balked at ACORN being a part of that scene. Remember, gang, these are the same folks who manipluated voting totals.
- That was now, this is then: I wondered yesterday what Democrats would have to say if Bush offered what Obama is, as a stimulus. Surber found the answer I was looking for. [7] Another massive double standard exposed.
- Eric Blair, call your office: The Obesity tax has failed here in NY. [8] But Patterson’s calling it all a victory. Orwell didn’t know the half of Newspeak, apparently.
- You sure you want to do this? Microsoft has apparently offered $250,000 [9]for the arrest and conviction of the hackers who wrote a particularly troublesome worm. Seems to me calling attention to the frailties in their software is not exactly a sales pitch.