Defining the Presidency Down

I've been a proponent, for many years, of returning to the days when the annual 'State of the Union' address amounted to a hand-written letter from 1600 Pennsylvania Avenue to the Congress. The founders intended the legislature to be the first/prominent  branch of government, NOT the presidency.

If we have anything to be thankful for from the Obama era, it's the re-emergence of this philosophy. Let's face it: he doesn't know what the Hell he's doing! And, yet, we've (barely?) survived, thus far.

I've also been a regular proponent of the "we get what we deserve" attitude toward governance. If we don't reject/eject the Democratic leadership in 2010, we need to understand we don't deserve a second chance at a republican (small-r) form of governance. The liberal fascists will have taken over.

In a best-case scenario, it will have been instructive and positive that we endured an Obama Administration. But, only if we reject it as unnecessarily and unnaturally authoritarian by American standards and desires.

Obama doesn't much like the United States of America up to 2008. We don't much care for his disdain. Let's make that point in 2010, okay?

I Remember When Obama Was 'Black'...

...but now he's just anti-American:

http://network.nationalpost.com/NP/blogs/posted/archive/2010/04/13/caption-this-obama-wags-finger-at-harper-during-nuclear-summit.aspx

(Yes, Canadians ARE Americans, too -- especially since they've tossed the Liberals/Frenchies/anti-Coulter government out.)

It's Time for Robert Gates to Resign

Why doesn't Secretary of Defense Robert Gates resign?

He suffered a personal and public humiliation last week when the Obama Administration trashed the long-servicing U.S. nuclear policy for idealistic (read that, "naive"), non-pro-American (see, I didn't say 'anti'-American!) political pabulum. It's increasingly plain that Gates' retention from the Bush Administration was both an admission by the Obamans that they don't have a clue about defense issues, and an attempt to triangulate criticism of their left/liberal leanings by retaining a hired gun of the hated 'Right'. Unexplained, is why Gates continues to play along. While his views were entertained by the administration, he served as a great patriot. But, with his attitudes and acumen cast aside, what more does he offer but political protection?

Nothing serves as a slap in the face to an administration more than the public divorce of a featured advisor. While I have little hope that the Obamanauts have enough introspection to feel chastened by a Gates resignation, it seems the only honorable 'out' left for  a hertofore honorable public servant.

Yep, a One-Term Volunteer!..

The likely practical application of President Obama's nuclear disarmament agreement with Russia, IF fully implemented, may reduce the former Soviet stockpile of thermonuclear weapons by 190, the U.S.'s by 100. A great trade, no? Well, no.

Because, along with it, Saint Obama is also issuing what may as well be called "The U.S. Nuclear Disarmament Promise" -- we won't drop a Bomb on you even it you devastate us! C'mon, let's face it: the only thing worse than a world with thermonuclear weapons is a world without them -- because there is nothing else so horrifying to keep at bay those non-liberal, non-democratic (not a single capital letter, so I'm not talking about Rush Limbaugh!) hegemons who might otherwise like nothing better than to see the world's greatest liberal/democratic republic disappear (if you include those who simply don't want to pay to defend themselves, that includes just about the rest of the world, okay?!). Give Mark Steyn a little credit -- America IS alone!

President Obama wants us just to be another of the supplicants to -- well, whom, exactly? (See the problem?)

Is it 2012 yet?

HRC 'Over/Under' Day

November 1 is the over/under day for whether or not Hillary Clinton has given up all hope of ever becoming president. She's well into her 60s -- if she waits till 2016, she will be approaching 70 years old.

Thus, if she still is Secretary of State in a failing administration the day before the 2010 mid-term election -- Nov. 1 --she's decided there is no hope for her presidential ambitions. If she plans to advance an intra-party challenge to President Obama in 2012, she MUST have resigned over 'philosophical differences' -- which she can then claim were consonant with Tea Party-ers' -- by then.

I am overwhelmed...

...by both current events and personal pursuits.

Re: the latter -- I have compiled more than 1,000 miles on my new/old motorcycle in the past 6 + weeks, including some 2-up riding (which is much harder, in the 'handling' stages of starting and stopping) with my lady friend/partner.

Externally, the national debate has become so rich in fodder that I've been unable to focus on any particular issue.

Today, however, I note a situation in which both sides are correct (a relative oddity in today's political dichotomy): President Obama's recess appointments of 15 executive-branch place-holders. I don't like most of them. Yet, I agree that the president has a right to make the appointments.

My only issue with the whole thing is the media's failure to point out the hypocrisy of Democrats who decried President Bush's use of recess appointments sidelined over philosophical matters, and the Democrats criticism of the GOP's disdain today of the appointees' philosophical standards.

Not only do the Democrats have no sense of irony, but they continue to demonstrate a philosophy that the electorate is stupid. The electorate gets the final say -- in November! As a Tennessean, I'm reminded of the legendary, if perhaps fabulous, comment from David Crockett: "Be sure you're right, then go ahead." Seems to me the Democrats have gone ahead before they were sure they were right.

Wal-Mart and Sen. Lindsey Graham...

It is said that any person or institution that is not completely conservative will eventually trend toward liberalism. Wal-Mart and South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham seem to confirm that thesis.
With Sam Walton dead, non-family Wal-Mart executives today concern themselves with warding off government action by becoming "green" and offering a broader range of benefits to its workers. Never mind that they were the leading private employer in two countries -- the United States and Mexico -- BEFORE they decided to kow-tow to political correctness.
Now, we see erstwhile conservative Sen. Lindsey Graham (R-SC) trying hard to accommodate the wrong-headed notions of the Obama Administration regarding the secure prison for combatants at Guantanamo Bay, Cuba (why doesn't anyone ever notice that we are ever-present in Cuba without destroying its antagonistic government these past 50 years, while lambasting us as universal imperialists? Don't you think we could posit enough firepower at Guantanamo to snuff the Castros at a moment's notice if we decided to?).
Regarding Wal-Mart, see here:
http://blog.american.com/?p=11074