We are well and truly screwed beyond all reason and comprehension.

Watch these two videos, watch these….these useless bastards in congress as they debate the appropriate method with which to destroy our future.

First up, Henry Waxman doesn’t even know what’s in the climate bill – you know, the cap and trade bill – and it’s his bill!

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Next up, we have an appearance by the speedreader:
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This is what Congress has become. The legislative process is a joke to these losers; they have zero respect for the office they hold or the public they were elected to serve.

It is time to clean house, and I mean fully.

Please America, I implore you….regardless of party affiliation, join me in 2010 in voting each and every one of these no good, corrupt, incompetent, sanctimonious, dirty sons of bitches out of office and onto the street where they belong.

We may have lost our way, but we sure as hell don’t deserve this.

-Cnation

I’ve never been a big fan of former Vice President Dick Cheney, but his speech today, in my opinion, hit it right out of the park. If you watched the two speeches back-to-back (Precedent Obama’s vs former VP Cheney’s), then you saw for yourself the stark contrast between a far-left rookie who still understands neither the threats we face as a nation nor the proper response to them, and a seasoned veteran statesman who fully understands who the enemy is and how they need to be dealt with in order to keep the United States safe.

Yes, Obama tries to talk the talk – at the moment anyway -  but his talk is that of a man whose direction, or at least his presentation, is dictated by focus groups and poll numbers rather than a set of core principals. And, as we’ve all seen, his track record to date is that of a man whose actions undermine his rhetoric every step of the way.

Say what you will about Dick Cheney, but there is no denying the validity of his words this morning.

“To the very end of our administration, we kept al-Qaeda terrorists busy with other problems. We focused on getting their secrets, instead of sharing ours with them. And on our watch, they never hit this country again. After the most lethal and devastating terrorist attack ever, seven and a half years without a repeat is not a record to be rebuked and scorned, much less criminalized. It is a record to be continued until the danger has passed.”

Amen.

Here is the full text of former VP Cheney’s speech .

Here is the full text of Obama’s speech

More from:
Michelle Malkin: Dueling banjos in Washington

Karl Rove: Flip-Flops and Governance

-Cnation

A Speed Reader For Congress?

The dems in congress have a speed reader on standby for when the house republicans do the unthinkable and actually demand that the disasterous Waxman-Markey Energy bill HR 2454 be read <gasp>.  Yes, you read that right. A speed reader. The whiz kid in question estimates that at the rete of 1 page every 34 seconds, he should be able to get through all 900+ pages in about 9 hours.

Have you had enough yet? Phone and email your congressman/woman and tell them in no uncertain terms that you expect them to vote NO on HR2454, and that you will be paying attention to their vote.

Here is a sample letter you can use, which is a modified version of the one found on the ATR website:

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Dear [representative's name here],

I am writing today to urge you to oppose the Waxman-Markey Clean Energy Bill H.R.2454 which will raise taxes, eliminate consumer choice, and put even more Americans – many of whom could be your constituents – out of work.

During this recession, a bill that will make energy more expensive will only serve to make matters worse for an enormous number of hard-working Americans, particularly those in the lower income brackets.

The “cap-and-trade” carbon emissions tax, created under this legislation, could result my family paying an extra $3,100 per year in new taxes and cost jobs in my community – up to 800,000 nation-wide.

An increase in energy costs and higher taxes is not something I want you, my Representative to support.

It is important that you make your opposition to the Waxman-Markey energy bill clear, as I will be following your votes and comments in the coming days.

Respectfully,
[your name]

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From WSJ:

WASHINGTON — Democrats in the House Energy and Commerce Committee have taken a novel precaution to head off Republican efforts to slow action this week on a sweeping climate bill. They are hiring a speed reader.

Republicans on the committee have said they may force the reading of the entire 946-page bill — as well as major amendments that measure several hundred pages — all aloud. This is a procedure lawmakers have a right to invoke. Republicans are largely against the bill, which aims to cut emissions of so-called greenhouse gases by more than 80% over the next half-century but would be costly.

Republicans haven’t tried the tactic, but Committee Chairman Henry Waxman (D., Calif.) is prepared.

A committee spokeswoman said the speed reader — a young man who was on door duty at the hearing as he awaited a call to the microphone — was hired to help staffers. After years of practice, the panel’s clerks can read at a good clip. But the speed reader is a lot faster, she said.

“Judging by the size of the amendments, I can read a page about every 34 seconds,” said the newly hired staff assistant, who declined to give his name. Based on that estimate, it would take him about nine hours. more……

Perfect. What scumbags.

Oh, almost forgot…. in case you were wondering who the mustachioed guy at the top of this post is, behold today’s history lesson…

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-Cnation

It is almost beyond comprehension that here we are four months into Obama’s presidency and nobody outside of the blogosphere – with the exceptions of Dobbs,  Fox News and conservative talk radio – is taking a serious in-depth look at ACORN, its myriad associated groups/companies, its political connections, and – most importantly – its close association with the Obama administration and role in bringing it to/keeping it in power.

I was speaking with someone the other day who gets their news primarily from the mainstream or Obama-friendly outlets (ABC, CNN, etc…) and our conversation reiterated, for me at least, how little the general public really understands about our federal government in terms of what its actual role is supposed to be and, more importantly, where its limits are as defined by our Constitution.

The lack of real reporting being done by the overwhelming majority of traditional media outlets these days is, in my opinion, largely responsible for this ignorance. With the exception of the current generation, Americans in general were raised to believe that the large institutionalized media outlets (CBS, NBC, ABC, NY Times, etc…) were the bringers of truth; if they said it, then that’s the way it was. Period. Not that it was necessarily so; some may argue – correctly perhaps – that major media has been corrupt to some degree or other for decades. There was, however, this perceived aura of integrity surrounding the major players that protect them to this very day from the critical scrutiny they deserve. Unfortunately, even as one major media outlet after another allows its objectivity to fall victim to ideology in obvious and even brazen ways, a large segment of the population still puts their trust in them fully and simply refuse believe that these outlets are either biased or corrupt despite the evidence.

The state of big media these days borders on criminal; the things they turn a blind eye to -  Obama’s ongoing shady campaign fund raising efforts, for example – belie any claims of unbiased reporting they may still make. Their lack of coverage of – and complicity in -  the massive political fraud happening before all of our eyes is disgraceful.

Michelle Malkin’s syndicated column today looks at one of these big media outlets in particular – the New York Times – and how “Fishwrap of Record’s admission that it spiked an election eve story on the possible illegal coordination between the Obama campaign and ACORN’s canvassing arm, Project Vote, has gotten zero scrutiny.”

Another absolutely mind-blowing read on the subject comes from the Gateway Pundit, and illustrates by example how Obama’s fund raising machine is still accepting donations from anyone, anywhere, with absolutely no verification of the actual source.

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-Cnation

Jumping around from link to link earlier this evening, I found possible the best article I’ve ever read on the current recession, from its genesis with the Community Reinvestment Act back in 1977 to the ultimate collapse of the housing market in 2008 and the carnage it caused.

Fannie/Freddie, ACORN, NWRO, Saul Alinsky, the Cloward-Piven Strategy of Manufactured Crisis (reading Cloward-Piven will give you tremendous insight into the methods currently being used by the Obama administration to achieve its goals), the Federal Housing Enterprises Regulatory Reform Act of 1992 – it’s all there.

The author’s name is Dianna Cotter, and her articles can be found at The Examiner.

In 2008, the United States would enter a recession that was 32 years in the making. Actions taken by congress starting in 1977 would begin the process that led to the catastrophic collapse of the housing market, which directly brought about the banking crisis that triggered the recession. The Community Reinvestment Act (CRA) passed in 1977 would create the framework for a machine of catastrophe. Building upon that framework, the Housing Enterprises Regulatory Reform Act of 1992 would force banks by law, to write sub-prime loans in federally mandated numbers that would eventually cause banks to collapse in America and around the world. Exacerbated by ACORN (Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now) and the Cloward-Piven Strategy of Orchestrated Crisis, the economy continues to spiral down in 2009.
If we can but prevent the government from wasting the labours of the people, under the pretence of taking care of them, they must become happy. Their finances are now under such a course of application as nothing could derange but war or federalism. The gripe of the latter has shown itself as deadly as the jaws of the former.
~ Thomas Jefferson, 29 November 1802

In order to put the fiscal situation of the United States into some context, a basic understanding of several factors is necessary. The CRA, Federal Housing Enterprises Regulatory Reform Act of 1992, ACORN, The Cloward-Piven Strategy, the Government Sponsored Entities (GSE’s) Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac, and their relationship with Congress are all significant gears in the machine that stopped the economy in its tracks. More……

Read the entire article here: Dianna Cotter: Recession of 2008-9 caused by Congress

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-Cnation

Gateway Pundit: GOP Now Tied With Dems In Party Identification
This took around 100 days…
Republicans are now tied with Democrats in party identification. For the first time since June 2005 Republican identification is equal to Dem identification:

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Jed Babbin: Richard Milhous Pelosi
“I have today issued another written statement, which addresses the charges that have been made since then as they relate to my own conduct, and which describes the efforts that I made to discover the facts about the matter…I stated in very specific terms — and I state again to every one of you listening tonight these facts — I had no prior knowledge of [it]; I neither took part in nor knew about any of the subsequent cover-up activities…That was and that is the simple truth.”

No, that was not House Speaker Nancy Pelosi’s latest speech re-explaining her knowledge that CIA interrogators waterboarded terrorist detainees.  It’s an excerpt from Richard Nixon’s August 15, 1973 speech denying involvement in the Watergate break-ins.  more…..

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Arthur Laffer and Stephen Moore: Soak the Rich, Lose the Rich
Updating some research from Richard Vedder of Ohio University, we found that from 1998 to 2007, more than 1,100 people every day including Sundays and holidays moved from the nine highest income-tax states such as California, New Jersey, New York and Ohio and relocated mostly to the nine tax-haven states with no income tax, including Florida, Nevada, New Hampshire and Texas. We also found that over these same years the no-income tax states created 89% more jobs and had 32% faster personal income growth than their high-tax counterparts.

Did the greater prosperity in low-tax states happen by chance? Is it coincidence that the two highest tax-rate states in the nation, California and New York, have the biggest fiscal holes to repair? No. Dozens of academic studies — old and new — have found clear and irrefutable statistical evidence that high state and local taxes repel jobs and businesses. more…..

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The Radio Equalizer: Obamist FCC Announces Crackdown On ‘Racist’ Radio Ratings
(h/t Michelle Malkin)
In what appears to be the first stage of a broader, Chavez-style crackdown against talk radio and its audience success, Obama’s FCC has taken an official step toward eliminating (or, at best, manipulating) an electronic ratings system his supporters consider “racist”.

That means stations with small but particularly loyal followings, such as hip-hop outlets, no longer wrongly benefit from distorted record-keeping meant to reward certain FM personalities. In many cases, other formats (especially conservative talk radio) are now experiencing a more accurate reflection of their listenership, leading to improved results. more…..

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CNN: GOP leader: Pelosi should show proof or apologize
“Lying to the Congress of the United States is a crime,” House Minority Leader John Boehner, R-Ohio, said on CNN’s “State of the Union.”

“If the speaker is accusing the CIA and other intelligence officials of lying or misleading the Congress, then she should come forward with evidence and turn that over to the Justice Department so they be prosecuted. And if that’s not the case, I think she ought to apologize to our intelligence professionals around the world.” more…..

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Duncan Currie: Alternative to Obamacare
Nancy Pelosi has declared that the goal of health-care reform is to achieve “quality, affordable, accessible health care for all Americans.” The Burr-Coburn legislation would not guarantee “universal” insurance coverage, but it would make quality health insurance and care more affordable and accessible. Conservative policy wonks will doubtless find nits to pick in the bill, and it’s unclear how many Republicans will embrace the Burr-Coburn approach. In recent years, says former GOP whip Rep. Roy Blunt, “no more than two dozen” Republican House members have been deeply engaged in the health-care issue. That is now changing, thanks in large part to the challenge of defeating Obamacare. more……

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-Cnation

Jim Treacher: Alternate universe: Obama’s WHCD speech
[A little Sunday afternoon levity.  -Cnation]
THE PRESIDENT: Thank you. Thank you, everybody. Good evening. It’s good to be here. It’s been… [checks watch] …wow, over 3 hours since I last gave a speech on TV. Starting to go through withdrawal.

Great to see everybody here tonight. So many good people. We’ve got Joe Biden here. Sheriff Joe. Just look at him. Smiling and laughing like he has any idea what’s going on. There ya go, Plugs, flash those choppers. You paid enough for ‘em. “Just make sure they match the hair I bought, Doc.” Folks, I hereby declare everything from Joe’s neck up a man-caused disaster. more…..

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M. Zuhdi Jasser: Accommodation as an Islamist Political Instrument
Political Islam’s ideological battle fronts are many. They can include the obvious like the liberation of Iraq or the rampant domestic and foreign policy speeches given under the guise of Friday sermons in mosques around America. However, an ideological front which is gaining traction among Islamists is that of religious accommodations (or demands) in our free society. Every week, it seems we are seeing new iterations of the same issue. Soon we must all ask — at what point do Muslim requests for accommodations to religious practices and beliefs cross the line of the fundamental basis of American liberty and freedom? more……

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Mark Steyn: Fun with Dick and Nancy
It’s worth noting that, by most if not all of her multiple accounts, Nancy Pelosi is as guilty of torture as anybody else. That’s not an airy rhetorical flourish but a statement of law. As National Review’s Andy McCarthy points out, under Section 2340A(c) of the relevant statute, a person who conspires to torture is subject to the same penalties as the actual torturer. Once Speaker Pelosi was informed that waterboarding was part of the plan and that it was actually being used, she was in on the conspiracy, and as up to her neck in it as whoever it was who was actually sticking it to poor old Abu Zubaydah and the other blameless lads.

That is, if you believe waterboarding is “torture.” more…..

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Steve Forbes: Don’t Doc American Healthcare
The U.S. medical system is hugely expensive and is not providing as good care to its citizens as socialized systems are in Canada and Europe–that will be a chief argument the Obama Administration employs to justify its new government health insurance plan for the 46 million Americans who are uninsured. The White House will further argue that competition from a public (i.e., government) company will force private insurers to cease underwriting the currently wasteful system. The Administration will also emphasize the alleged horrors of the status quo, claiming, for instance, that most personal bankruptcies in this country are caused by health care debts and that every year nearly 20,000 people die in the U.S. because they are uninsured. more…..

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Roger Kimball: The Meaning of Obama, Part II, with a note from J. L. Austin and an epitaph for cognitive dissonance
It turns out that Bush was a rank amateur when it came to profligacy. His $400 billion deficit, which seemed like a lot of money at the time, is not even a weekend’s “stimulus” bill for Barack Obama, Nancy Pelosi, Harry Reid & Co. A week or so ago, the White House told us that the budget deficit for the current fiscal year would be $1.75 trillion dollars ($1,750,000,000,000). Somebody forgot to include the party favors, though, because a few days later that estimate was raised to $1.84 trillion ($1,840,000,000,000), a difference of some $90 billion, or more than 4 times the $17 billion in “savings” that Obama announced with such fanfare recently. After the laughter subsided — after all, the President’s Potemkin cuts amount to 1/2 of 1 percent of his budget — Obama shot back: “In Washington, I guess [$17 billion is] considered trivial. Outside of Washington, that’s still considered a lot of money.” more…..

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-Cnation

A great article by Victor Davis Hanson over at Pajamas media. While i’m generally a fan of his writing and more often than not in agreement with his point of view, this article – which looks at where the Obama administration is going wrong and where the real resulting danger lies for the United States -  is probably one of the most on-target pieces he’s written, at least that I’ve ever seen.

Fissures in the Obama Totem

Oh, I know that President Obama’s approval ratings are still around 62%. But I also remember that George Bush’s at the end of 2001 got even higher — and stayed at or above 60% through most of 2002, explaining why he increased his congressional majority in the midterm elections.

Nevertheless, I think we are beginning — after less than four months — to see fissures in Obama’s Pentelic statuary. And the cracks will widen, because in about six areas he has taken on human nature itself, age-old logic, and common sense-opponents that even a Harvard Law degree and Chicago organizing are no match for….

….Obama has somehow already used the tax last resort. That is, his figures assume taking off FICA caps, watching the states increase their own tax rates, upping the federal rate to 40%, curbing deductions, and effectively increasing the total state and federal bite to above 65% on top incomes.

Fine. But the deficits still go up, adding an aggregate $8-9 more trillion to the debt. The magnitude of borrowing is so staggering that there is almost no conceivable way that we can ever balance the budget without simply confiscating incomes in toto, or taxing our very sneezes. This will blow up in the administration’s face as well. The taxes will discourage and dishearten entrepreneurship as the spending increases unproductive sectors of the now federalized economy, as in turn a larger fossilized constituency demands ever more entitlement and more taxes for “them.”

I do not know what is worse, the mega-interest to come on the debt; the stifling of economic initiative and the rise of barter, off the books income, tax avoidance, or simple slowdowns; or the creation of vast new dependent classes who vote in exchange for entitlement.

Read the whole thing here:
Victor Davis Hanson: Cracks in the Facade

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-Cnation

This is absolutely astounding -  Obama warning us about the dangers that lie ahead from an unsustainable deficit as though he didn’t have a direct hand in creating it…

From the LA Times:

What I’d like to do is just shift off — pivot off your question to talk about this issue of debt and deficits one more time.  During a recession of this severity it is important, as I explained, for the government to step in and fill the hole in demand that was created by consumers and by businesses, to get the economy kick-started.

But the long-term deficit and debt that we have accumulated is unsustainable.  We can’t keep on just borrowing from China, or borrowing from other countries — (applause) — because part of it is, we have to pay for — we have to pay interest on that debt. And that means that we’re mortgaging our children’s future with more and more debt, but what’s also true is that at some point they’re just going to get tired of buying our debt.

And when that happens, we will really have to raise interest rates to be able to borrow, and that will raise interest rates for everybody — on your auto loan, on your mortgage, on — so it will have a dampening effect on the economy.

So we are going to have to deal with our long-term debt.  As I said before, the biggest thing that we can do on that front is to deal with entitlements.  We are going through the budget, line by line, page by page, rooting out waste and abuse. more……

This is a man who knows he has over half the country fully duped.

What he is doing here is preemptively addressing what conservatives, economists, and the CBO have been trying to tell everyone for the last several months, that the reckless Obama budget, in concert with the ‘stimulus’ package and the financial black hole of TARP spending, is on track to cause tremendous damage to our economy by ‘stimulating’ inflation, interest rates, and necessary, massive tax increases across the board.

Just a recap:

The deficit under George W Bush: 400 billion
The deficit under Obama – 1.85 trillion (that’s one thousand eight hundred fifty billion)(!)

Here’s a chart comparing past and projected federal budget deficits:

The Obama Deficit

It’s things like this that make one wonder if “Barack” is Kenyan for “large brass balls”….

Gateway Pundit has more

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-Cnation