WEDNESDAY,  FEBRUARY 11,  2009

PRIORITIES? - AT 9:54 P.M. ET:

WASHINGTON (AP) -- With thousands of fraud investigations under way, the FBI is considering shifting agents away from counterterrorism work to help sort through the wreckage of the financial meltdown.

FBI Deputy Director John Pistole told the Senate Judiciary Committee on Wednesday that the bureau may reassign some of the positions that were reallocated to anti-terrorism work after the Sept. 11, 2001, attacks.

Such a move would be a further sign of the government breaking with the Bush administration's priorities, which pledged to assign every available resource to averting another terrorist attack.

COMMENT:  Feel safer?  With all the hundreds of billions they're spending on the "stimulus" package, you'd think they'd find some funds to increase the size of the FBI, hire and train more agents, and do both terror and fraud investigations.  Why should we have to choose?  We all know why.  Look who's in charge.

BUT THEY WON'T SPEAK FRENCH - AT 8:37 P.M. ET: 

WASHINGTON (AP) -- Sen. John Kerry, chairman of the Foreign Relations Committee, is planning to travel to Syria next week, where he will meet with President Bashar Assad.

The trip, confirmed by a spokesman for the Massachusetts Democrat, comes as President Barack Obama looks for a way to repair the U.S. image abroad and engage regimes hostile to U.S. policies.

COMMENT:  Ordinarily, I'd say I'd want to be a fly on the wall during that meeting, but a fly on the wall would die of boredom.

WILL THEY EVER UNDERSTAND? - AT 7:29 P.M. ET:  From The Washington Times:

House Republicans are challenging Speaker Nancy Pelosi's claim that the massive stimulus spending bill contains no pet projects after uncovering in the bill more than $30 million for wetlands conservation in her San Francisco Bay area district, including work she previously championed to protect the salt marsh harvest mouse.

COMMENT:  What is it with these right-wing, capitalist warmongers?  Don't they understand anything?  Where would this country be without the salt marsh harvest mouse?   Why, just yesterday I was reading Abraham Lincoln's tribute to that patriotic creature.  Much better than the Gettysburg Address.  I guess we'll have to put up with these Republicans until the new order arrives and the Fairness Doctrine gets rid of their mouthpieces.

QUOTE OF THE DAY - AT 7:08 P.M. ET:  From Michael Gerson at The Washington Post, who worries that President Obama's much-touted idea of pragmatism is devoid of any guiding principles:

It is still early in the Obama era. But it is already evident that pragmatism without a guiding vision or a fighting faith can become little more than the service of insistent political interests.

COMMENT:  Absolutely true.  President Bush was savaged by the "intellectual" classes for being too much of an idealist.  But we can use some of those ideals right now.

CHILL WIND FROM THE NORTH - AT 6:19 P.M. ET:  From Canada's National Post:

The Ontario Human Rights Commission is calling for Parliament to force all Canadian magazines, newspapers and "media services" Web sites to join a national press council with the power to adjudicate breaches of professional standards and complaints of discrimination.

Chilling already.  Now, this is what it's really about:

The media's freedom of expression comes with a duty to "address issues of hate expression, and [media] should do so either voluntarily through provincial press councils, or through statutory creation of a national press council with compulsory membership," the report reads.

Translated into English:  "Hate," these days, is often a code word.  This is about complaints by radical Muslim groups who want to shut down any criticism of what they do.  They've tried this in Canada before, targeting writers like Mark Steyn.  How long before this kind of thing drifts down here?  Look at "speech codes" on college campuses for the answer.  Many of our students are being taught that suppression of free speech is just fine in pursuit of a "better" society.  Brrr. 

SENSITIVITY, AND TASTELESSNESS - AT 5:58 P.M. ET:  From The New York Times:

Defense Secretary Robert Gates suggested on Tuesday that he was open to allowing the media to photograph the flag-draped coffins of fallen soldiers as their bodies and remains are returned to the United States.

"If the needs of the families can be met and the privacy concerns can be addressed, the more honor we can accord these fallen heroes, the better," Mr. Gates told reporters.

COMMENT:  This whole issue infuriates me.  Let us use common sense here.  The people who are so insistent on vulgarizing our sacred war dead by photographing their coffins aren't interested in "freedom of the press," or "the people's right to know."  Our people know that men and women are killed in war.  They know what a coffin looks like.  They are sensitive to the loss felt by each family.  No, these insistent shutterbugs have another agenda - to demoralize the country, to teach Americans a "lesson" about the cost of Iraq, to advance their own political point of view.  They are tasteless.  This isn't about "honoring sacrifice."  It's about demeaning it.

MORE ORNAMENTS TO FREE ENTERPRISE - AT 5:45 P.M. ET: 

Feb. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Merrill Lynch & Co.’s top four bonus recipients received a combined $121 million just before the firm was acquired by Bank of America Corp., according to New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo.

In all, Merrill “secretly and prematurely” awarded $3.6 billion in bonuses, with Bank of America’s “apparent complicity,” Cuomo said in a Feb. 10 letter to Representative Barney Frank, the Massachusetts Democrat who heads the House Committee on Financial Services. The letter was made public today as chief executives from the eight largest U.S. banks face off against lawmakers at a committee hearing in Washington.

COMMENT:  If we slip into socialism in this country, part of the blame will lie with "executives" like this, who are providing all the excuses the leftists brigades need.  Lenin said that the capitalist West would sell Communist Russia the rope with which it would then hang the West.  These guys are among the top rope salesmen.

HOW THE DOW? - AT 5:28 P.M. ET:  The Dow closed up an anemic 51 points, to 7939, hardly a 21-gun salute to the stimulus package, and a shadow of the almost 400-point decline yesterday.

BULLETIN AT 3:43 P.M. ET:  From The New York Times:

WASHINGTON — Congressional negotiators announced Wednesday afternoon that they had reached agreement on a $789 billion economic stimulus bill, clearing the way for final action and President Obama’s signature.

COMMENT:  This bill is thousands of pages, and weighs pounds and pounds.  How did they go through all those items so fast?  They didn't, at least not carefully, which may be the real story here, and the ultimate tragedy. 

KATHLEEN COMING HOME - AT 3:22 P.M. ET:  Kathleen Parker, who wrongly went after Sarah Palin during the late election campaign, now is partially redeemed by writing a perceptive column on President Obama and his deficiencies.  Consider this:

Absent is maturity -- that grown-up quality of leadership that is palpable when the real deal enters a room. There's a reason why elders are respected. They have something the rest of us don't have -- yet -- because we haven't lived long enough. We haven't made the really tough decisions, the ones that are often unpopular.

And...

Obama's lack of authority over the stimulus package has underscored the value of political experience and toughness -- and given weakened Republicans the leverage they needed to launch an aggressive attack.

Well worth the read.

JINDAL RISING - AT 3:20 P.M. ET: 

BATON ROUGE, La. (AP) -- Louisiana Gov. Bobby Jindal will get another prominent GOP role later this month when he delivers the national Republican response to President Barack Obama's first speech to Congress.

Obama plans to speak to a joint session of the House and Senate on Feb. 24 about the problems facing the nation. The speech will be similar to a State of the Union address.

Jindal will give the Republican response in a nationally televised address from Baton Rouge immediately after Obama's speech, U.S. House and Senate Republican leaders announced Wednesday.

COMMENT:  Great.  Jindal is a terrific, dynamic guy.  Obama's speeches as president have been dull and draggy.  Jindal, a problem solver, can show a contrast.  Selecting him shows solid strategy.

HILLARY?

Posted at 11:10 a.m. ET

We've asked the question before:  Why would Hillary Clinton give up a probable lifetime seat in the U.S. Senate to become a Cabinet officer for a man who defeated her and wants to neutralize her as a political threat? 

Reader Jim Birdsall alerts us to the fact that Dick Morris has been asking the same question.  Morris writes a devastating column explaining Hillary's plight:

Secretary of State Hillary Rodham Clinton is finding that her job description is dissolving under her feet, leaving her with only a vestige of the power she must have thought she acquired when she signed on to be President Obama’s chief Cabinet officer.

This is what's happened since she took the job:

Vice President Biden has moved vigorously to stake out foreign policy as his turf...

...Richard Holbrooke, the former Balkan negotiator and U.N. ambassador, has been named special envoy to Afghanistan and Pakistan. He insisted on direct access to the president, a privilege he was denied during much of the Clinton years...

...Former Sen. George Mitchell (D-Maine), negotiator of the Irish Peace Accords, was appointed to be the administration’s point man on Arab-Israeli negotiations...

...Samantha Power, Obama’s former campaign aide, who once called Hillary a “monster,” has been appointed to the National Security Council (NSC) as director of “multilateral affairs"...

...Gen. James L. Jones, Obama’s new national security adviser, has announced an expansion of the membership and role of the NSC...

...Susan Rice, Obama’s new United Nations ambassador, insisted upon and got Cabinet rank for her portfolio...

Where does this leave Madame Secretary?

While sympathy for Mrs. Clinton is outside the normal fare of these columns, one cannot help but feel that she is surrounded by people who are, at best, strangers and, at worst, enemies.

Yeah, you do get the feeling.  For Hillary, though, that's the normal condition.

Hillary’s essential problem is that she is an outsider in the current mix. She was the adversary in the campaign, and Rice and Powers — at the very least — know it well, having helped to run the campaign that dethroned her. Can they — and she — be devoid of bitterness or at least of normal human trepidation? Not very likely.

And the reality:

The power of the secretary of State flows directly from the president. But Hillary does not have the inside track with Obama.

Finally...

So what is Hillary’s mandate? Of what is she secretary of State? If you take the Middle East, Afghanistan and Pakistan out of the equation, what is left? One would have to assume that the old North Korea hands in the government would monopolize that theater of action. What, precisely, is it that Hillary is to do? The question lingers.

And for this she gave up a Senate seat?

Yes, she did.  And we can almost envision the day she'll see it in her interest to resign, possibly in protest over a policy, possibly because Obama will fail and she won't want to be linked to the failure.  Don't count her out.  That mistake has been made before.

February 11, 2009.      Permalink          

REMEMBER THESE GUYS? - AT 10:26 A.M. ET: 

SEOUL, South Korea (AP) -- North Korea has been moving missile equipment to a launch pad in a further indication the country is taking steps toward test firing a long-range missile, a news report said Wednesday.

The report came the same day that North Korea announced it had replaced its two top military officials and amid heightened tension between the Koreas. Pyongyang said late last month it would scrap all peace accords with Seoul and has periodically warned of war on the divided peninsula.

COMMENT:  This comes at a time when there's doubt about whether Obama will continue our missile-defense program.  Doubt is not good.  It creates a vacuum.  The North Koreans will be more than happy to fill it. 

MORE CHEER FROM THE MONEY MEN - AT 9:53 A.M. ET: 

Feb. 11 (Bloomberg) -- Pacific Investment Management Co., which runs the world’s biggest bond fund, said the global economy faces a “second wave” of turmoil unless governments adopt larger spending plans.

“The economic setback is still in its early stages,” Koyo Ozeki, head of Asia-Pacific credit research at Pimco’s Tokyo office, wrote in a report published today on the company’s Web site. “Any further decline in housing prices could accelerate the downturn, intensifying the pernicious feedback loop and possibly leading to a second wave in the financial crisis in the next six to 12 months.”

COMMENT:  We've had this warning before.  There seems to be a stoicism on the part of most Americans, possibly stemming from the fact that The One is in power, with the audacity of hope floating around, and the fact that most people haven't been hit that hard and, as of now, that directly.  Clearly, that can change.  If the stimulus and bailout plans start to fail, there could be a bitter backlash, accompanied by an accusatory atmosphere.

DOW NOW - AT 9:40 A.M. ET:  The Dow opened up 75, for no apparent reason.

IN THE TANK JOURNALISM?  NAH. - AT 9:11 A.M. ET:  There's over the top, then there's over the cliff.   Put Vogue magazine and The Washington Post together, and that cliff is coming up pretty fast.  Vogue will feature Michelle Obama on its March cover, and the Post has a story about that story.  The Vogue cover reads:

MICHELLE OBAMA
The First Lady the World's Been Waiting For

Really?

The world?  The whole world?  They've been waiting for Michelle Obama in Finland?  Is the waiting over in New Zealand?  How about Honduras?  Did Vogue do a poll there?  As we've said in this space before, whenever they tell you that "the world" is doing something, run in the other direction.

It doesn't end there.  The Post's story on the story gushes with gush.  Get this.  Really savor it:

She is wearing a magenta dress by Jason Wu, who designed her inaugural ball gown. Her hand rests under her chin. Her left hand is folded beneath her.

Behind her, soft light streams between curtains. It is the pose of America's sweetheart.

It is?  This is the way a sweetheart poses?  I did not know that.

And then:

Even if you take race off the table, there is an awe of how this new administration can bring energy to the conversation around how beauty can intersect with power. And how power can be beauty.

The reporter who wrote this story needs restraining devices.  They're available in those little stores that feature crutches in the window and neon signs saying, "We take Medicare."

AN AFGHAN GREETING - AT 8:41 A.M. ET:  From The New York Times:

KABUL, Afghanistan — Attackers firing automatic rifles and wearing explosive vests stormed the Justice Ministry in central Kabul on Wednesday while others burst into another government building in the north of the city, triggering chaos as ministry workers fled, witnesses said.

Coming on the eve of a scheduled visit by Richard C. Holbrooke, President Obama’s newly appointed special envoy to Pakistan and Afghanistan, the attacks displayed the apparent ease with which Taliban insurgents who control much of the Afghan countryside can also breach the defenses of the heavily-fortified capital.

COMMENT:  This will be hotter than Iraq very soon.  Ambassador Holbrooke has gotten his reception. The key figure here, of course, is President Obama.  Will he have the fortitude of President Bush, or devise a way to get out, without any real gain for us?

A FLOP IN FULL - AT 8:20 A.M. ET:  Cue the organ music: 

"Will blond-haired Kirsten, from the sweet, conservative towns north of New York, be able to survive in the cold, heartless precincts of the big city, as she fights for the career that is the stuff of dreams?"

Organ music down.  Commercial:  Ivory Soap.

And that's what it's become here in New York - a soap opera starring Senator Kirsten Gillibrand, recently appointed by Governor David Paterson to replace Hillary Clinton.  Gillibrand, presumably a moderate, hails from outside the holy city of New York, and, in New York Democratic politics, that's a sin in itself.  Now she's run into the establishment's buzz saw.  The New York Post reports the depressing result: 

Gillibrand, formerly a single-term centrist congresswoman from a Republican-leaning Upstate district, is running as fast as possible from every position that used to separate her from the state's Democratic elite:

* On immigration, she'd been a vocal opponent of "any proposal" that would have given amnesty to illegal aliens - until a group of Hispanic Dems threatened to torpedo her re-election hopes. Now she conveniently backs a "path to citizenship" for illegals.

* The same goes for gay marriage, which she campaigned against in 2006 but now says she supports.

* Meanwhile, though she continues to insist she supports "hunters' rights," Gillibrand - formerly an aggressive Second Amendment supporter - apologized yesterday for not being "a leader" in fighting gun violence.

COMMENT:  That's simply the reality here.  She's got to run in 2010 for the remainder of Clinton's term.  She'll probably face a primary challenge.  No dissent is permitted, and there is no respect for any position from outside the New York City orbit.  Also, the Kennedy family wants to erase Gillibrand because she got the Senate appointment that Caroline had wanted.  I'd give Kirsten no better than a 50-50 shot at political survival. 

BAD REVIEWS - AT 7:43 A.M. ET:  From The Politico:

The Obama administration’s revamped program to fix the nation’s ailing financial markets was met with harsh criticism Tuesday, as the stock market tumbled and lawmakers complained that it lacked details and missed essential targets.

The generally negative response to the new plan unveiled by Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner means the White House will clearly have to invest more time, energy and political capital into explaining the package and selling it to Congress.

COMMENT:   How many months has the Obama team had since the election to get things right?  I think it's three.  Oh, and Tim, while you're patching this program, make a note to get your taxes in.

ISRAEL RESULTS - AT 7:18 A.M. ET:  Results of the Israel election were inconclusive.  The centrist Kadima Party, headed by centrist Foreign Minister Tzipi Livni, edged out the rightist Likud, headed by former Prime Minister Binyamin Netanyahu.  However, rightist parties, considered as a bloc, did slightly better than leftist and centrist parties.  President Shimon Peres will consult with the parties and will choose either Livni or Netanyahu to try to form a coalition government.  His heart is probably with Livni, but practical politics and raw numbers may favor Netanyahu.

COMMENT:  Neither Livni nor Netanyahu are bargains.  Livni is considered something of a lightweight.  Netanyahu is a heavy-handed heavyweight, ambitious and obnoxious.  When he was prime minister he had a poor relationship with President Clinton, whose wife is now our secretary of state.  His hard-line policies, while they may well be correct, and are often brilliantly stated, can give ammunition to some of the anti-Israel hangers-on in the Obama administration, like Samantha Power.  On the other hand, Livni would be quicker to give in to the "negotiations above all" crowd.  Bumpy road ahead.

TUESDAY,  FEBRUARY 10,  2009

INTRODUCING MEG WHITMAN - AT 8:23 P.M. ET:  Andrew Malcolm runs the superlative Top of The Ticket blog for the Los Angeles Times.  It's among the best political blogs around, and is listed as one of our "sizzling sites" in the left-hand column.

Today Andrew introduces us to Meg Whitman, who apparently wants to succeed Aah-nold as governor of California.  One of my gripes about current journalism is the failure to provide solid, complete biographies of news figures.  There are even gaps in President Obama's biography that have yet to be filled.  And, of course, we've all seen some intellectual fashion plates described by the press as "anti-war" activists or "peace activists," only to learn later that they had 40-year records in some of the darker swamps of radical politics, with not a hint of it in their media descriptions.

Andrew shows us how it's done - basic information, clearly presented in sufficient detail, about someone who wants to run our largest state.  She's impressive.  Well worth reading.

THE SHADY BUNCH - AT 7:38 P.M. ET:  Fox News did a devastating report this evening on some of the Obama administration's new Justice Department appointees, the ones right below the level of attorney general.  One is best known for defending pornographers.  Another defended Osama bin Laden's driver.  Another wanted to bar military recruiters from the Harvard campus.  And a fourth was instrumental in cutting off food and water to Terri Schiavo, in Florida, in the now-famous right-to-life case. 

COMMENT:  You really have to wonder how they managed to put this team together.  It is a feast for the left, a nightmare for the rest of us.  I get the sense - and this is just informed speculation - that the Obama team has carved up the government and given several areas to its leftist base.  One is the Justice Department, the other is the energy/environmental sector.  We'll just have to be on guard every moment.  When we realize that Justice is the front-line department in the fight against domestic terror and crime, and that the Energy Department is in charge of our nuclear weapons, we have reason to stay awake at nights, and not simply because we want to read novels.

DEMOCRACY NOW! - AT 5:54 P.M. ET:  My Iranian activist friend Banafsheh Zand-Bonazzi alerts us to the happy, delightful celebration of the 30th anniversary of the Islamic revolution in Tehran.  The hoopla!  The music!  The joy!  From The Times of London:

Iran’s former president was set upon by an angry stick-wielding mob today amid celebrations of the 30th anniversary of the Islamic Revolution on the streets of Tehran.

The attack on Mohammed Khatami came just two days after the reformist cleric announced he would be running against the hardline incumbent Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in June's presidential elections.

Mr Khatami, then a little known cleric, came to global attention when he was elected to the presidency in 1997, capturing almost 70 per cent of the vote. Succeeded in 2005 by Mr Ahmadinejad, he blamed hardline elements in the clerical establishment for obstructing his reformist agenda.

During the revolutionary celebrations, attackers waving sticks approached the cleric, shouting “Death to Khatami. We do not want American government.”

COMMENT:  And the fact is, as Banafsheh points out, that Khatami is no great reformer.  He's actually a hard-liner with a bit more velvet over his beheading knife.  He also encouraged and continued the Iranian nuclear program.  Welcome to the new era in relations with Iran.

TWO HEADLINES - AT 5:46 P.M. ET:  Two headlines from today's Washington Post online edition:

Dow Tumbles 382 Points on Bank Bailout Plan

And...

First Lady Gets Vogue Cover

Is there a values disconnect here somewhere?

DOW CLOSE - AT 4:08 P.M. ET:  Preliminary figures show that the Dow closed down 382, to 7889.  

THE DOW NOW - AT 3:43 P.M. ET:  The Dow is down 408, to 7862.  This is not funny.  If it reflects the confidence of the financial markets in the Obama administration, we may need a lot more than a stimulus package. 

BULLETIN AT 3:35 P.M. ET:  First exit polls give the centrist Kadima party a slight edge in Israel's elections.  However, the party's leader, Zippi Livni, may not be able to form a government because of opposition to her from the right.  She was given the chance to form a coalition in the fall and failed, leading to this election.  Stand by.

SHE SPEAKS - AT 3:07 P.M. ET:  Hillary Clinton lives.  She speaks:

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Secretary of State Hillary Clinton said on Tuesday a final decision on deployment of a missile shield in eastern and central Europe hinged in part on Iran's willingness to curb its nuclear ambitions.

"This is one of those issues that really will rest with the decisions made by the Iranian government," Clinton said of plans to install radar in the Czech Republic and interceptor rockets in Poland to shield against ballistic missiles fired by "rogue" countries like Iran.

"If we are able to see a change in behavior on the part of the Iranians with respect to what we believe to be their pursuit of nuclear weapons, then we will reconsider where we stand," she told reporters after meeting Czech Foreign Minister Karel Schwarzenberg.

COMMENT:  Again, the key is in the details, whether or not the policy is carried out wisely, and whether it is undercut by certain elements in the Obama White House.  However, this could be a shrewd move - putting the onus on Iran, hoping Russia will join us in pressuring that country to get rid of its missiles and its nuclear program.  It's probably a pipe dream, but it's a lot better than caving in to the "negotiations above all" crowd.

YOW DOW - AT 2:45 P.M. ET:  The Dow is down 359, to 7912. 

SAILING TO NOWHERE - AT 2:40 P.M. ET:  From The New York Times:

WASHINGTON – The Senate voted on Tuesday to approve an $838 billion economic stimulus plan that stands to become the most expansive anti-recession effort by the United States government since World War II.

Congressional leaders said they would immediately begin to work out the differences between the Senate measure and an $820 billion version passed by the House, with President Obama also likely to have a strong voice in the talks.

COMMENT:  And still, we're not really sure what's in this bill.  Change we can believe in?  This is change we can't even understand.

DOW NOT WOW - AT 11:55 A.M. ET:  The Dow is down 312, to 7958.  Not a great review for the administration's fiscal plans.

THE PITCH

Posted at 9:57 a.m. ET

When a Hollywood writer sits down to try to sell a new movie or TV show to a producer, it's called "the pitch."  I've been there many times.  The idea is to get the producer to commit to the next stage, known as a "development deal," where someone writes a check so you can develop the idea while not starving.  When you're doing the pitch you may know, or may not know, what you're going to do if you ever reach that next stage.  Some have gotten a development deal and realized they had nothing to develop. 

I had that impression in listening to the president last night.  Mr. Obama speaks beautifully.  We know that.  He has an active mind.  We know that, too.  And he looks good.  Women tell me that. 

But I felt too often that I was listening to a pitch, and that the pitchman had no idea what he would do if we gave him the deal.  The strategy here, if there is one, is to follow what congressional Democrats have done, surrender to them, and put on a happy face.  I had no sense that the president had thought through the next stage.  Neither did I have a sense that he'd know what to do if the stimulus package passed and failed.  Like a good pitchman, the president had his talking points in order, but little else.

The press questions were fair, some rather good, and none threw Mr. Obama off.  However, like so much in the president's recent verbal arsenal, the weaponry failed to conquer.  Maybe we've already begun to be skeptical.  Or maybe the American people know, instinctively, the difference between campaign rhetoric and the language of governing.  I can't imagine any of the masses rushing to the barricades after last night's presentation.

The emperor does have clothes.  But I think he's begun a bit of a strip-tease.

February 10, 2009.       Permalink              

INCREDIBLE - AT 9:34 A.M. ET:  From the DC Examiner, via reader Ken Braithwaite:

* ACORN could receive up to $4 billion under the economic stimulus legislation approved by the House of Representatives.
* ACORN has received an estimated $53 million in government funds since its founding in 1970.
* ACORN is under investigation in at least 14 states in connection with allegations of voter registration fraud in the 2008 campaign.

ACORN claims to represent low-income workers but does not pay its own employees the minimum wage and in 1995 sued California for an exemption from its minimum wage requirement.

A multi-million dollar liberal non-profit activist conglomerate reportedly under federal investigation may get a big piece of the economic recovery stimulus pie now under consideration by Congress.

It’s the Association of Community Organizations for Reform Now – the infamous ACORN.

COMMENT:  Phone your congressional offices.  This is an outrage.

QUOTE OF THE DAY, THUS FAR - AT 9:18 A.M. ET:  From the great Thomas Sowell, writing at Townhall.com: 

Elementary as it may seem that we should hear both sides of an issue before making up our minds, that is seldom what happens on politically correct issues today in our schools and colleges. The biggest argument of the left is that there is no argument-- whether the issue is global warming, "open space" laws or whatever.

Some students may even imagine that they have already heard the other side because their teachers may have given them their version of other people's arguments or motives.

But a jury would never be impressed by having the prosecution tell them what the defendant's defense is. They would want to hear the defense attorney present that case.

COMMENT:  Well said.  But try to convince an anthropologist at Berkeley.

THE AFGHAN DILEMMA - AT 8:41 A.M. ET:  Afghanistan is increasingly in the news.  Can we win there?  Should we pull off another surge?  Urgent Agenda has an independent source, an American traveler with detailed knowledge of the region, who tells us the following:

Karzai is in an impossible position.  There is nothing he could have done to change the realities here...a wartorn "country" with no history or memory of nationhood, no real economic prospects other than a pervasive and corrupting drug industry, a backward, illiterate, and primitive population that is divided into tribes to which they are fiercely loyal. He is surrounded by rivals and power brokers and nations who do not care what happens to "Afghanistan" as longs they get theirs.  It is a miracle he has lasted so long.  

Only his counterpart in some twenty, thirty years hence has any chance of presiding over stability, but it will likely be some rump-state of what is Afghanistan today. The current borders encompass too much conflict, too many rivals, too many irreconcilable interests.

Obama has to make a choice...am I willing to be here for the long haul and endure the slings and arrows that Bush did at the nadir of the Iraqi effort?  Or shall we narrow our aims dramatically and beat a hasty retreat?  I don't envy him his decision....it's an impossible situation.

COMMENT:  Please note that there is a world of difference between this analysis and the "cut and run" ruminations of the political left.  There are people who think we "can't" win because they think we never should win.  Avoid at all costs.

FOLLOW THE MONEY; IT ALWAYS LEADS TO THE SAME PLACE - AT 8:36 A.M. ET:  From an excellent, exclusive report in the conservative Washington Times:

Wall Street executives have pleaded economic ruin, secured hundreds of billions of dollars in taxpayer assistance and been pilloried for their business excesses. But none of that has curbed their appetite for doling out political donations - or the willingness of politicians to accept the largesse.

A Washington Times analysis found that executives and employee-funded political action committees of banking companies that received bailout money have donated more than $2 million to members of Congress and other politicians since lawmakers approved the federal rescue of America's financial system in October.

COMMENT:  Business in Washington is always business as usual.  While there are no doubt some visionaries trying to improve the system, there are many others, on Wall Street and elsewhere, including inside the headquarters of labor unions, who are simply inventing new ways to engage in the same excesses again, but not get caught at it next time.

OH, AND THEN THERE'S THE BILL FOR THIS - AT 8:13 A.M. ET:  From The Washington Post:

The gravity of the financial crisis confronting the Obama administration will come into stark focus today when officials unveil a three-pronged rescue program that may commit up to $1.5 trillion in public and private funds, and possibly more, lawmakers and other officials said.

COMMENT:  Read the fine print here.  In fact, call in the electron microscope and read the very fine print. This is the program for the financial sector.  There'll be no new requests to Congress for more money...now.  "Now" may be the most expensive word in the current economic debate.  This program is in addition to the "stimulus" package.  So far, there's been stunningly little transparency in the financial-sector aid program run from Washington.  We'll be watching to see if this changes, or if the money boys wield their usual influence in the capital to prevent any snooping around by journalists and regulators.   

THE TIMES BEHIND THE TIMES - AT 7:42 A.M.  For an example of obsolete economic thinking, consider this quote from this morning's New York Times editorial:

Aid to states is excellent stimulus because the money is funneled quickly to public employees, private contractors and beneficiaries of public programs. The Senate bill falls far short. It provides $40 billion less to the states than the House’s version — money that is mainly targeted at education budgets.

COMMENT:  How is money funneled to public employees stimulative?  Also, when will The Times finally abandon the 1960s cliché that education in America is constantly short of funds?  Education in many areas of the country is actually overfunded.  The scandal is what's done with the money.  Pouring good money into bad for education programs that fail to educate is policy at its worst.

ISRAEL VOTES - AT 7:31 A.M. ET:  Israel votes today, in an election that can have a significant impact on the "peace" process and on the country's relationship with the Obama administration.  Early report:

Voter turnout in Israel's general election Tuesday was heavier than expected, standing at 23.4 percent of the electorate by midday.

In contrast, only 21.7 percent of voters had cast ballots by the same point during the last election in 2006. If the voter turnout remains constant throughout the day, the final rate could reach 69 percent, as opposed to 63.5 percent in the 2006 vote.

COMMENT:  Once the election is held, the candidate at the top will be given a certain number of days to form a coalition government, one of the great ballets in modern democratic politics. 

ON THE ONE HAND, ON THE OTHER HAND - AT 7:16 A.M. ET:  The esteemed maximum leader of Iran offers Mr. Obama an olive branch, with intensely sharpened thorns.  Responding to the administration's offer of talks, Mahmoud Ahmadinejad giveth, and taketh away:

Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad said Tuesday the world was entering a "new era of dialogue" and his country would welcome talks based on mutual respect with the United States, its longtime adversary.

And here comes the astirisk:

"If you really want to fight terrorism, come and cooperate with the Iranian nation, which is the biggest victim of terrorism, so that terrorism is eliminated. ... If you want to confront nuclear weapons ... you need to stand beside Iran so it can introduce a correct path to you," he said.

COMMENT:  In other words, no change from previous position.  It's okay to talk, as long as we Iranians do the talking.