Posted on 05/03/2009 7:01:06 AM PDT by greyfoxx39
Will Rogers famously pleaded that all he knew was what he read in the papers. If all a person knew of Barack Obamas first 100 days as president was what they read of them in this newspaper, it would seem to be a very charmed young presidency.
The Chronicle Herald recently made space for an urgent Associated Press dispatch from Washington informing readers the Obamas had chosen a Portuguese water dog. Not original reporting, of course, but an AP rephrasing of a White House-arranged scoop in the Washington Post online.
That was followed by a crack Canadian Press report, drawn from such gumshoe news-gathering as reading the Huffington Post, on the "hillbilly" Republican governor of Alaska: her "family and political theatrics that would do Jerry Springer proud," like "the arrest and indictment of her sister-in-law on break-and-enter charges" and "the sordid revelations of her daughters ex-boyfriend."
The Portuguese water dog and Alaskan "hillbillies" news beats apparently leave little time for anything remotely skeptical of the president of the United States. And they wonder why folks arent buying the papers like they used to.
So here is a small selection of news on the most powerful man on Earth which has been deemed unfit to print:
Obamas first two major bills alone, the "stimulus" and "omnibus," cost nearly twice as much as was spent on Iraq over six years $1.2 trillion vs. $650 billion.
Obama abandoned his campaign promise of "a net spending cut," his first annual deficit not counting bailouts being three times the worst deficit under President George W. Bush.
Obamas objective in his first G20 summit commitments to spend our way to prosperity with massive stimulus boondoggles across the G20 was rejected out of hand.
Obamas objective in his first NATO summit commitments to combat troops for Afghanistan from "our European allies," which Obama and his party imagined were ready and willing to fight if only someone "enlightened" like him were running things was predictably refused, with some more European non-combat contingents offered as a token.
Obamas Defence Department announced cuts of $1.4 billion to missile defence, the day after North Korea test-fired its long-range, multi-stage ballistic missile.
Obamas economics were criticized by Warren Buffet, whose endorsement had been candidate Obamas highest economic credential.
Obama reversed the free trade Bush policy that had allowed about 100 Mexican tractor-trailers into the United States, which the Mexican government immediately used as an excuse to levy tariffs on 90 American goods amounting to $2.4 billion in U.S. exports.
Obamas "tax cuts for 95 per cent" turned out to mean $13 a week from June to December, to be clawed back to $8 a week in January as compared with President Bushs 2008 tax rebates of $600 to $1,200 plus $300 per child, which were notably scoffed at during the election campaign by Michelle Obama.
Obamas campaign promise of a $3,000-per-employee tax credit for businesses that hired new workers repeated ad nauseam for weeks before the election was discreetly retired even before inauguration day.
Obama abandoned his campaign promise that "lobbyists wont work in my White House," waiving his no-lobbyist executive order or conveniently re-
defining his appointees past lobbying work to allow 30 lobbyists into his administration.
Obama abandoned his campaign promise to reform earmarks, signing the omnibus bill which contained 8,816 of them.
Obama took more money from AIG than any other politician in 2008 over $100,000 and signed into law the provision guaranteeing the AIG bonuses which later had him in front of the cameras "shaking with outrage" and siccing the pitchfork crowd on law-abiding citizens who had fulfilled their end of a contract and had their payment upheld by Obamas own legislation.
Why should these points, and many more like them, have to be made by some obscure contributor to The Chronicle Heralds opinion pages?
Fox News Channel is the butt of jokes and the target of attacks like no other media outlet in the English-speaking world, not least by people who fancy themselves the guardians of a free press. But Fox News is today the lone television news service in the English-speaking world capable of serious skepticism and scrutiny of the sitting president and the Congress of the United States.
Fox News is also the second most-watched channel in all American cable television. It long ago became by far the most-watched cable news channel; more Americans watched Fox News than CNN and MSNBC combined in every time slot from 6 a.m. to midnight in April. Now, while The New York Times is $1.3 billion in debt, Fox has expanded its operations with a business channel and a juggernaut Internet presence.
Theres a lesson there, though Fox News will be just as well pleased if the impeccably "mainstream" news business remains clueless about it.
The people need a Fourth Estate, not yet another adulator of Barack Obama, yet another smearer of Sarah Palin, yet another patrician editor to keep out anything disagreeable to progressive sensibilities, yet another laptop-and-latte journalism-schooler to spit on everything pre-dating 1968. And they wonder why the news business has come on hard times.
Andrew W. Smith, from Cape Sable Island, N.S., writes and resides in Tulsa, Okla.
Ping
This is such an excellent article. I email the link to everyone in my address book.
Great compilation. Thanks for posting.
Interesting article.
Thanks for posting it.
My local newspaper was at one time worth $20 per share. Last time I looked it was worth 35 cents per share. Yet they keep pushing the same liberal agenda at all costs. This article pretty much sums up why I quit my subscription.
BTTT
OBAMA BUMP
bookmark
Watergate or no can you imagine the press’ reaction to tongue-in-cheek ‘grades’ issued by Nixon spokesmen? They would be foaming at the mouth.
The MSM is fighting for its life. If the media can’t continue to sell the ‘Bama as the true living god, both they and the ‘Bama are done for. And the polls are beginning to show they’re losing.
BTTT
Great post! This is fodder for a graphical chart, I will get right on it.
regards, Howie
The LibTards don’t want the truth. They are still marching merrily along with the anointed one on his “Sashay to Socialism” tour.
And, the Pubbies are yammering about creating a new compact with America; building a ‘new’ GOP. All they really need to do is embrace true conservative principles, develop an attack-dog mentality and give the LibTards the same treatment they’ve been getting from the Left for the last 60 years.
It’s time to take back the country.
BTTT
Why doesn’t the writer of this piece just come out and say what he MEANS, instead of hedging around at his point?
The past 100 days has ben nothing less than a teardown of the Constitution, either by redefining its terms to the most elastic of meanings, or ignoring the provisions altogether when they became inconvenient.
It is time to get up and recite the words of the Delclaration of Independence, as many of the original complaints have come around to refer more and more to the behavior of the current occupant of the Oval Office, Resident (Pres_ent) Barack Hussein Obama Jr., or Barry Soetero, or Mr. Michelle Robinson, or Sock-Puppet, whichever name fits.
He has delegated authority AND responsibility, with no inclination to own up to his original stated intentions. He has forced corporations and financial institutions to come to totally unwarranted and inimical agreements concerning their future viability, and has dictated the placement and even pay of their senior management, all without regard to the free exercise of choice in the marketplace.
He has traded on perceptions from a century ago, that some sort of progress is being made daily, while the economy and social structure revert to some far past and known failures that have been tried elsewhere in the world, down through history, and all of which have failed to measure up to the one best-proven and tested social contract that has proven superior in giving the greatest good to the greatest number, and provided for the continued expansion of that known and proven good.
The world does not need to fall into a new Dark Age. The vague and false image that just tapping into the almost magical capture of the sun and wind to provide all the power our country, and the world, shall need to meet the demands of daily life, is just that, a promise that cannot and will not be fulfilled.
We NEED energy, lots and lots of it, far more than the scanty trickle from the uncertain supply from the draft of winds or the limited amount from sunlight that can be received for only a portion of the twenty-four hours in a day.
Then there is the matter of transporting all this energy, by a cumbersome network of switches and lines, that necessarily must come for many miles to be distributed at the place where it is consumed.
There are alternative sources. But these have been summarily excluded for flimsy and poorly understood excuses, relating to either ignorance, or taking advantage of the ignorance of others. The supply of coal, petroleum and natural gas far exceeds the requirements to support a large and growning industry concerned with converting this potential energy of these resources to real wealth, the kind of wealth that PAYS OFF even huge expenditures made by individual citizens, corporations large and small, the agencies that support and embrace these citizens, and the governments that purport to serve the needs of those citizens, and by extension, the corporations owned by these citizens through participation ownership.
And the greatest source of truly cheap and abundant energy, the application of the newest of technology for the production of energy through nuclear power. There is no such thing as “depleted” atomic fuel, it simply requires the application of additional known technology to continue to extract the energy from these various radioactive isotopes, until all the potential energy has been extracted, and the remaining substances are benign and really harmless. This energy need not only be confined to the production of immediately usable electrical energy, the excess heat formed may be used to purify water through distillation and condensation, providing an additional source of clean potable water, taken from brackish, saline, or even badly polluted water, converting it all into a highly valuable and extremely useful product in huge abundance, enough so that whole deserts may be made to bloom, and the general health of whole populations may be encouraged to improve, and add to the total value of mankind itself.
Good find.
Be sure and ping me to the graphical chart. Thanks.
Nicely stated!
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