Chicago Republicans

This time, Obama's lies have turned out to be good for the nation.  The Associated Press reported last week that President Obama plans to support extending three key provisions of the Patriot Act set to expire December 30 this year.

Though he strongly criticized President Bush for using "unconstitutional methods" to protect the public, now that he's in office The Anointed One has changed his tune.  Maybe he knows that, heaven forbid, another attack on US soil would doom his re-election bid in 2012.

Specifically, he's supporting the right of the Justice Department to conduct the so called "roving wiretaps," arbitrarily monitor library records and have more broad access to financial transactions without probable cause.  These three elements have been described as the best methods to deal with "lone wolf" terrorist groups and individuals.  Previously, the President called Bush's methods unconstitutional; how will he explain his support now that he's in office?  He won't, of course and the previously incensed elite media will ignore the story.

On a similar note, last week his Administration announced they cannot meet the January, 2010 closing of Gitmo.

On a similar note, again, the President will meet next week in Geneva to discuss the Iran situation, sans Iranian officials.  I remember a junior Senator from IL back in 2007 calling President Bush's decision to not negotiate with Iran "disgraceful."  Maybe he's finally learned that he can't just smile, read the teleprompter, and have everyone follow his lead.

It's about time.

Source: http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090916/ap_on_go_ca_st_pe/us_patriot_act

This past month the President showed us another talent of his, something he's really quite good at - distraction.  Magicians refer to distraction as, "misdirecting the audience's attention to perform your secret moves without notice."  While sitting down with Sgt. Crowley, Professor Gates and VP Biden, BO tried his best to focus our attention off the major issues of the day.  Whether it be ObamaCare, a 2nd Stimulus Bill, canceling missile defense development while North Korea launches missiles, offering for the umpteenth time negotiate with Al-Qaeda or anything else on his far-left agenda, he's done his best to have us look this way while he's doing something else that way.

Fortunately, some news outlets are calling him out on the above issues - primarily Fox News and, in fairness, to some extent, CNN and the Washington Post.  While all of the above noted issues are important, I haven't seen much coverage, anywhere, of another issue that seems to have fallen off the radar - the closing of Guantanamo Bay Naval Base.  On January 22, 2009 BO signed an Executive Order to close Guantanamo within one year.

On May 22, 2009, the US Senate effectively halted the President's plan by voting to keep the facility open, indefinitely, and refusing to fund the transfer of any prisoners to the US mainland until the Administration produced a "coherent plan for closing the prison."  Be honest - do you remember hearing about this on any major news outlet?  This was a MAJOR defeat for the President.  Of course, at the time of the vote, the Senate expected the so called Terror Policy Report within a month.

Last week the Administration quietly announced it had not yet completed the plan even though a six-month self-imposed deadline had come and passed.  Administration officials have stated the President granted a six-month extension.  This means the report on how to detain, interrogate and transfer to American or foreign soil suspected terrorists isn't even due, let alone to be implemented, AFTER the deadline BO set Guantanamo's closure.

This should be major news, but it's not "sexy" compared to the outrage over ObamaCare or the ridiculousness of the staged beer event.  A cornerstone of The Apologizer's campaign was the closing of Guantanamo Bay, now, even as President with a Democratic majority in Congress, he can't accomplish it.  We should all be grateful, Obama has stumbled yet again and we may be a lot safer for it.

Sources:

AP sources: Gov't delays terror policy reports

http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/20090721/ap_on_go_pr_wh/us_guantanamo

"Senate Nixes Obama's Guantanamo Plan" http://www.cbc.ca/world/story/2009/05/20/obama-guantanamo.html

http://www.magicwhiz.com

I am writing this in the Richard J. Daley center waiting to see if I will be selected for a jury for the notorious Cook County Circuit Court. This gives me an opportunity to think about the latest Obama agenda item, healthcare. Especially since sitting in a large room waiting for bureaucrats to determine my fate might be like visiting the doctor under an Obama plan. And, eerily, the TV in the waiting room is tuned to the ABC channel. It is clear our President wants to focus completely on revamping the healthcare industry not just insurance. It is a shame that all that "internal"turmoil in Iran, the mere saber rattling of North Korea testing nukes and imprisoning U.S. Citizens, or the mischaracterization of terrorists being released from Gitmo to take up snorkeling in the tropics might distract us. But these are not the priorities on Mr. Obama's agenda who tells us that the real "ticking time bomb" is healthcare. He is so determined to scare us into believing that there is a crisis in healthcare rather than insurance that he has convinced ABC to broadcast infomercials selling his agenda. Our shepherd-in-chief has gotten very good at crying wolf. Much of what he and the Congressional Democrats are saying is illusory or misleading at best and outright wrong at worst. The rush is on not to fix the problems in existing systems but to write in a whole new one - with no evidence or assurances that it won't face the same shortcomings. Taxpayers need to ask three questions:

1. Is there a true crisis regarding the quality and delivery of health care? No doubt our insurance system is cumbersome, costly and flawed but people are not being turned away from our hospitals. We have the best medicine in the world and foreigners come here to get what their national systems cannot provide. There is a difference between being uninsured and not having access to care and this is what should be closely examined. Even by the Administration's own accounts, a new plan would only cover a third of those currently uninsured.

2. Isn't it cheaper and easier to examine and fix the problems of the variety of existing (private, federal employee, Medicare/Medicaid) insurance systems? Obama is trying to "sell" his plan by alleging that his plan will make private plans more "competitive" and will be "free" to become more efficient and provide better options. I find it amusing that he of all people is using national healthcare as a tutorial on free market principles. It is a simple fact that when the government enters into an industry where it is not bound by market prices and has unlimited tax funds to provide subsidies, it actually squelches competition. Just this week, here in Chicago at the AMA, Obama tried to sell his plan to the very folks who will live and work by its terms and they remain unconvinced. It did not help that Obama was unwilling to discuss one of the single most stifling costs to healthcare, medical malpractice caps and liability insurance. It will be his plan on his terms appeasing those interests that provide him support.

3. Are Congressional Democrats and this Administration the ones to rewrite healthcare? These are the folks that brought us Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac or currently oversee Medicare and Medicaid. What makes us think that government bureaucrats are good at running these things, although if a 31 year old law student can run a car company...at least Hillary had meetings and a task force. Speaking of which, I realize that having the First Lady involved can be damaging, but currently Obama's only experience with healthcare seems to be having his wife earn $300K a year for a hospital system which has yet to be an example of reform and efficiency.

Our President has made it clear that he is determined to stay on track with his ambitious domestic agenda and nothing, not even the threat of a destabled Iran, will derail him. We all saw how he crushed the fly that got in the way of his CNBC interview. Earlier today, he just announced a revamping of the finance industry, with the typical claim that it is in the direst of straits. What is next? What I don't understand is how he can cry wolf about every domestic policy and downplay the only genuine crises to which he is constitutionally obligated. I guess it's his party and gets to cry wolf when he wants to.