Free Republic

This from Jake Tappers Abc Blog at 9:36p.m. Eastern time. Seven blue dog Democrats on the committee have said they can't vote for the Health Care bill in its current form. Some of these 7 met with Obama today at the White House for 2 1/2 hours,....This is bad news for Obama's Health Care Bill...story from Abcnewsblog

ABC News' Jake Tapper and Sunlen Miller report: The other day we heard a comment from a White House aide that never would have been uttered during the primaries or general election campaign. During a conference call in preparation for President Obama's trip to Cairo, Egypt, where he will address the Muslim world, deputy National Security Adviser for Strategic Communications Denis McDonough said "the President himself experienced Islam on three continents before he was able to -- or before he's been able to visit, really, the heart of the Islamic world -- you know, growing up in Indonesia, having a...

First President in US History to Have Voted to Filibuster a Supreme Court Nominee Now Hopes for Clean Process May 30, 2009 1:08 PM President Obama's expressed hope today in his weekly address "that we can avoid the political posturing and ideological brinksmanship that has bogged down this (Supreme Court nomination) process, and Congress, in the past" runs against another historical first for the 44th president: his unique role in history as the first US President to have ever voted to filibuster a Supreme Court nominee. So while there is little indication Republicans intend to filibuster President Obama's nominee for...

"We began by passing a Recovery Act that has already saved or created over 150,000 jobs and provided a tax cut to 95% of all working families," the president said Wednesday night. We wondered where the president got that from, given that the Bureau of Labor Statistics estimates that more than 1.3 million jobs were lost in February and March, with dismal April numbers to come. We were told by a White House official that the Council of Economic Advisers estimated the effect of the stimulus bill on employment in two ways: One was to prorate the original quarterly estimates...

Surely one of the worst jobs in Washington is that of cleaning up after the Human Gaffe Machine, AKA Joe Biden . . . On shovel duty today at the White House, press secretary Robert Gibbs made a laughingstock of himself as he asserted what Biden “meant to say” regarding swine flu. The press corps didn’t merely titter at Gibbs’ travails. They outright laughed in his face at the press sec’s tortured attempt at vice-presidential revisionism. View video here.

ABC's Jake Tapper questioned Gibbs why the Obama administration was making a large deal over saving $100 million in his proposed budget when the administration pooh-poohed $8 billion in an appropriations bill several weeks ago. (see video by following link)

The Bush administration got excoriated by the Left for its expansive use of the state-secrets doctrine. Barack Obama and other Democratic presidential hopefuls pounded Bush for its use. In fact, that was one of the principal components of Hope and Change — a shift away from secrecy and back to the “rule of law,” although no one has shown how Bush actually broke any laws in the first place. Apparently, Obama agrees, and as Jake Tapper reports, has decided to expand the Bush practice on state secrets:

On 'State Secrets,' Meet Barack W. Obama April 10, 2009 9:20 AM In February, President Obama's Justice Department quietly argued in a San Francisco court that it was maintaining the same position as President Bush's Justice Department on a case involving detainees trying to sue a private company for its role in their (allegedly) extraordinary renditions. The Obama administration pushed the status quo administration argument by invoking the "state secrets" argument, also a Bush-era fave. "It is the policy of this administration to invoke the state secrets privilege only when necessary and in the most appropriate cases," said DOJ spox...

Jake Tapper isn’t the easiest guy to interview. After all, when your interview subject is a competent journalist, he or she already knows all the tricks of the trade — the subtle flatteries, the ever-so-slightly leading questions — so Tapper isn’t about to say any more than he has to about his personal politics or what goes on behind the scenes of his job as ABC News White House correspondent. Or it’s possible Tapper doesn’t want to talk about these things because he’s one of the last remaining journalists in America who take the responsibilities of their jobs seriously, and...

Is President Barack Obama's administration showing hints it is losing confidence in Treasury Secretary Timothy Geithner? CNBC's Larry Kudlow said the signs are suggesting as much. The host of "The Kudlow Report" said in an appearance with CNBC On-Air Editor Charlie Gasparino on his March 17 broadcast that a statement put out earlier today by the administration, and placed at the top of the Drudge Report, hinted this was the beginning of the end for Geithner. "You know, statements out of the blue - statements like this are what I call a real bad leading indicator that Geithner's time, days...

ABC's Jake Tapper is one of the few White House Press reporters who have not been swigging down the Presidential cool aid. He asks the questions that we want to know. Take the case of the AIG executive bonuses. Yesterday all hell broke loose when the news began to filter out a about the major green given out to AIG executives because of contractual obligations. Since the federal treasury has been forking over our tax dollars to AIG every few weeks since the first bailout, the questions arises, why didn't anyone know about the contractual bonuses before last week? Jake...

Somewhere Ron Ziegler is laughing . . . Pres. Nixon’s feisty late press secretary would have to tip his hat to Robert Gibbs for the brazen stonewall he put up today to Jake Tapper’s line of questioning on what the Obama administration knew about the AIG bonuses and when they knew it. Tapper’s basic point was this: instead of trying to stop the bonuses now, when the administration is in a relatively weak bargaining position, why didn’t the administration demand that the bonuses be killed as a condition for the granting of the latest billions in bailout money given to...

Last evening’s Fox News Watch included an homage to Sam Donaldson on the occasion of his retirement. Asked if there were reporters currently on the scene like Donaldson, panelist Jane Hall responded: “we don’t see a lot of them. Some people think Jake Tapper has been pretty aggressive.” Tapper, ABC’s chief White House correspondent, has given recent evidence that he is among that rare breed of MSMer willing to report inconvenient facts about the Obama administration. As Jennifer Rubin at Commentary’s Contentions blog has observed, it looks like Tapper is the only MSM outlet to have reported this story: "Brian...

ABC News has learned that the Obama administration will begin the process of releasing a prisoner from the Detainee Center at Guantanamo Bay next week, perhaps as early as Monday. Binyam Mohamed, a 30-year-old Ethiopian and legal resident of the UK, will be transferred into British custody, government officials told ABC News. The British will fly Mohamed back to England. The British government has signaled it intends to subject Mohamed to surveillance, but he is not expected to be arrested. British authorities have long expressed concern that any evidence against Mohamed would be inadmissible because of alleged torture against him...

Is it Jake Tapper or Jake Scrapper? I am beginning to think the later as amongst the Obamagobbed media, ABC News' senior White House correspondent Tapper is emerging as the man ever ready with the pointed question for Obama and his administration. We may even call Tapper the Sam Donaldson of the Obama era. We all remember the many long years when Sam Donaldson would stand before Republican presidents (oh, and Clinton, too) and their press secretaries and, in that accusing monotone, ask the the most pointed question of the day, don't we? Of course, we also remember the less...

Here is video of ABC News' Jake Tapper nailing White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs to the wall today on President Obama's statement yesterday, directly contradicted by Caterpillar's CEO, that passage of the Stimulus Plan would lead Caterpillar to rehire laid off workers. He also asked Gibbs what it says about Obama that no Caterpillar workers lobbied Rep. Aaron Schock to vote for the Stimulus Bill despite Obama putting him on the spot yesterday to do so in front of the workers. In both cases, Gibbs refused to really address the questions. Jake Tapper is showing himself to be a...

ABC's tenacious reporter is already proving to be the new star of the White House press pack. Last night’s prime-time presidential address may have been like prom to the White House press corps, but every high-schooler knows that reputations are made in the schoolyard. And for the freshman class of 44, the first skirmish happened last Thursday in the White House briefing room between presidential Press Secretary Robert Gibbs and ABC’s Jake Tapper. Tapper, the network’s ambitious, telegenic Senior White House Correspondent, has made a name for himself as a tough questioner, but last Thursday, Tapper’s tenacity didn’t just get...

Here is video of White House Press Secretary Robert Gibbs getting irritated with ABC News Reporter Jake Tapper. Tapper was pressing Gibbs on making documents available on whether Obama nominees have paid taxes. Gibbs was flippant with Tapper and eventually completely ignored a second question asked by Tapper. It's still early, but it seems to me that Robert Gibbs is a total bust as Press Secretary. He is very poor at the give and take with the press corps on camera. He made a fool of himself today, and showed himself to be as thin-skinned as the President he serves....

ABC News has learned that on Friday, President Obama will likely order the Department of Defense's Military Commission to withdraw charges against terrorist suspect Abd al-Rahim al-Nashiri. The charges may later be reinstated in a military commission or pursued in a civilian court. Al-Nashiri will remain in custody. The announcement will not be made until after President Obama meets with the families of victims of terrorist attacks on 9/11 and on the U.S.S. Cole, where he will assure them that this step is not being done to be lenient towards al-Nashiri. The move is being done to stop the continued...

My item of earlier this afternoon notwithstanding, not everyone at ABC is in the Obama tank. During the course of the campaign, Jake Tapper distinguished himself among his MSM colleagues by asking tough questions regarding candidate Obama. He did so both on the air, and notably in postings at his Political Punch blog. Recently named ABC’s Senior White House Correspondent, Tapper has served notice that he hasn’t lost his fastball. Readers will recall my item of yesterday describing how CBS’s Early Show weekend anchors apparently thought it was a good idea to have themselves posterized in the iconic Obama style...