Boker tov, Boulder!

'Nuclear Option' was designed for... DEFICIT REDUCTION (plus: meet the Byrd rule)

Here's the amazing irony of the day:  According to this (thanks to Stefanie for sending), the 'nuclear option' or reconciliation process was designed for .... {drum roll} ... deficit reduction.

That's one reason the Chair of the Senate Budget Committee Declares [that] Reconciliation Can't Be Used for Health Care.

Then there's apparently something called the Byrd Rule.  Now Sen. Byrd takes a lot of crap for his past association with the KKK and he takes a lot more crap for bringing home lots of bacon pork to West Virginia.  He has done that in spades, and it's a good thing, too, because otherwise we wouldn't have any highways here.

[Tangent: If you hear on FOX News that he got millions of your taxpayer dollars to pay for a highway called "Corridor H" that reporters say "goes nowhere," don't believe it.  It's a necessary highway that was supposed to connect to the remainder in another state (whose senators must have neglected to bring home the needed bacon for their side of the border).  This "Corridor" -if ever completed- will be a godsend if Washington DC ever has to be evacuated, and we all know how likely that is, Gd forbid. Anyway, this is neither here nor there, so back to the Byrd Rule...]

As per Ace and Hot Air, Sen. Kent Conrad (D-ND) sez

It will not work… It will not work because of the Byrd rule which says anything that doesn’t score for budget purposes has to be eliminated. That would eliminate all the delivery system reform, all the insurance market reform, all of those things the experts tell us are really the most important parts of this bill....

Major credit where major credit is due.  If the Byrd Rule stands in the way of passage of Obama's government takeover of healthcare, then Gd bless Senator Robert Byrd of the great state of West Virginia.  That's the second great thing he's done since I've been paying attention. (The first was almost exactly a year ago.) The combination of these two could prove pivotal to the lawful restoration of our personal liberty.  If so, Sen. Byrd will truly have served his state and his country well.

Around these parts it's always been said that Byrd is the constitutional scholar of Congress.  I was going to say that perhaps he was too early, given the recent interest of the tea parties, but when you think about it, perhaps he was paving the way for us.

I don't always agree with him, but in this instance I may come to be very, very grateful to him.  And for a lot more than highways.

 

IDF distributing gas masks to our brothers and sisters in Israel

While Americans fret over the earthquake in Chile and argue about whether or not to accept "affordable healthcare" from the same folks who brought us "affordable housing" ...

the IDF has begun distribution of gas masks in Israel.

Read all about at JPost.

 

Quote of the Day

“How stupid is it of us to ask those who brought us 'affordable' housing to now turn their attention to bringing us 'affordable' health care?”

Read it ALL at El Marco. 

Taxed Enough Already (TEA) + 1 year

Signs at NYC Tea Party Anniversary yesterday.

More at Urban Infidel.

Plus, there is a great photo essay of the Tea Party's historic first year -- by El Marco: Happy Birthday to the Party of HELL NO!

NOW I get it... If the Repubs are the party of No, then we Tea Party people are the party of HELL NO!  If the Republicans will just go there, there can be a merger. I guess it all depends on how reticent the RINOs are.

Love this:

Good Shabbes

 

Israel will go it alone

It was inevitable that the U.S. and Israel would part ways.  The moment Barack Obama was elected, Israel lost a very important ally.  The Jews will go it alone and I venture to predict their success.  America, not so much.*

 

WASHINGTON (Reuters) – Israel's perspective on Iran's nuclear program differs from that of the United States, and the two may part ways on what action to take, Israeli Defense Minister Ehud Barak said on Friday.

Washington's clout over its Middle East ally is under scrutiny after Israel's veiled threats to attack Iran preemptively if international diplomacy fails to rein in Tehran's uranium enrichment, a process with bomb-making potential.

The United States this week said it did not want to hurt the Iranian people with "crippling" sanctions against Iran's energy sector, measures Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has described as the only viable diplomatic solution.

"There is of course a certain difference in perspective and a difference in judgment and a difference in the internal clock, a difference in capabilities," Barak told the Washington Institute for Near East Policy think-tank, when asked about Israeli-U.S. discussions about Iran.

"I don't think that there is a need to coordinate in this regard. There should be understanding on the exchange of views, but we do not need to coordinate everything," said Barak, who was in Washington for strategic talks.

Barak, a centrist in Netanyahu's right-leaning coalition government, reiterated Israel's argument that an Iranian bomb would destabilize the region by sparking an arms race and emboldening Islamist guerrillas sponsored by Tehran.

"Probably from this corner of the world it (Iran's nuclear program) doesn't change the script dramatically," he said, speaking in English. "From a closer distance, in Israel, it looks like a tipping point for the whole regional order, with quite assured consequences for the wider world."

*See the quote Michele Bachmann references, quoted at Jewish Current Issues earlier this month.

OU comes out swinging... for Israel ... against the White House

The Orthodox Union is upset with the Obama administration for criticizing the Heritage Plan, under which Israel will invest $100 million in rehabilitating historic and religious sites throughout Israel. Netanyahu included among the sites the Tomb of the Patriarchs in Hebron and Rachel’s Tomb in Bethlehem. Palestinians objected, and then the State Department chimed in and called the inclusion of such sites “provocative.”

The OU responded: “It is not ‘provocative’ to invest in and rehabilitate holy/historic sites — that are open to both Jews and Muslims. Nothing PM Netanyahu has proposed precludes a peace agreement. It is provocative for the Palestinians to assert that there is no Jewish connection to these sites and for them to use this as yet another false basis for refusal to engage in peace negotiations.”

 

From Jennifer Rubin at contentions.

Logic can quickly crumble before madness

Prof. Louis Rene Beres at Myths and Facts:

Facing Nuclear Madmen? Israel's Security and Enemy Rationality

"Do you know what it means to find yourselves face to face with a madman," asks Luigi Pirandello's Henry IV.  "Madmen, lucky folk, construct without logic, or rather with a logic that flies like a feather."  What is true for individuals is sometimes also true for states. In the often absurd theatre of modern world politics, constructions that rest upon ordinary logic can quickly crumble before madness.

    Consider Israel, especially as it may soon have to confront an Iranian nuclear adversary with a potentially “suicidal” preference ordering. Left to proceed unhindered with its ongoing and illegal (under international law) program of nuclearization, Iran’s current leadership (and possibly even a successor “reformist” government in Tehran) could proceed to value Israel’s destruction more highly than even its own physical security. Such a prospect is highly improbable, to be sure, but – if rooted in particular visions of a Shiite apocalypse - it is not inconceivable.

     Israel’s ultimate source of national security lies plainly in nuclear deterrence. Although obviously still implicit, and not at all open or acknowledged, this policy that is necessarily based upon enemy rationality could “crumble before madness.” In certain imaginable instances, the result of failed Israeli retaliatory threats could be total destruction.

    By definition, the logic of deterrence always rests upon assumptions of rationality. History, however, reveals the persistent fragility of all such assumptions. We know too well that nations sometimes even behave in ways that are consciously self-destructive. Sometimes, perhaps even mirroring the infrequent but decisively aberrant behavior of individual human beings, national leaders choose to assign the very highest value to preferences other than collective self-preservation.

     Strange as it may seem, it has happened before, and it will happen again.

"We will keep this promise to the American people"

Remarks by the President at the Annual Conference of the American Medical Association, June 15, 2009 - posted at WhiteHouse.Gov:

"... let me begin by saying this to you and to the American people: I know that there are millions of Americans who are content with their health care coverage -- they like their plan and, most importantly, they value their relationship with their doctor. They trust you. And that means that no matter how we reform health care, we will keep this promise to the American people: If you like your doctor, you will be able to keep your doctor, period. (Applause.) 
 

 

If you like your health care plan, you'll be able to keep your health care plan, period. (Applause.)

 

 

Rasmussen:

46% of Democrats say it would be good for the workers... if a company dropped its private coverage and their workers were enrolled in a government-run plan.

 

Boker tov Friday: Americans are paying attention

Just read this comment at www.Gretawire.blogs.foxnews.com .  In these crazy times, you have to admire people like this "Bo," who still have enough presence of mind to make a list.

Sorry if this offends anyone but it's just the facts... Let's Recap "2009".........what a year!

1. The American people inaugurate a half-Arab president with a total of 142 days experience as a US Senator from the most politically corrupt state (city) in America whose governors have been ousted from office. The President's first official act is to order the close of Gitmo and make sure terrorists civil rights are not violated. (honest mistake?)

2. The U.S. Congress rushes to confirm a black Attorney General, Eric Holder, whose law firm we later find out represents seventeen Gitmo Terrorists. (An honest mistake?!)

3. The CIA Boss appointee, Leon Panetta, has absolutely no experience, has a daughter Linda, we find out, who is a true radical anti-American activist and a supporter of all the Anti-American regimes in the western hemisphere. (There were socio-economic factors involved!)

4. We got the second most corrupt American woman (Pelosi is #1) as Secretary of State; bought and paid for. (You can put lipstick on a pig, but it still stinks!)

5. We got a Tax Cheat for Treasury Secretary who did not properly file his own taxes for 12 years. (He misspoke!)

6. A Commerce Secretary nominee who withdrew due to corruption charges. (Another honest mistake???)

7. A Tax cheat nominee for Chief Performance Officer who withdrew under charges. (Hmmm... Another screw-up?)

8. A Labor Secretary nominee who withdrew under charges of unethical conduct. (OK, maybe this person was just plain stupid.)

9. A Secretary HHS nominee (Daschle) who withdrew under charges of cheating on his taxes. (I'm running out of excuses for these idiots!!)

10. Multiple appointments of former lobbyists after an absolute campaign statement that no lobbyists would be appointed.

(Dear God, I am getting a headache!) All this occurred just during the first three weeks. . . But who's counting? America is being run by the modern-day Three Stooges ; Barry, Nancy and Harry and they are still trying to define stimulus..."it's spending!!!" The congress passes the $800,000,000,000 (that's $800 billion) pork-loaded spending bill where the government gives you a smidgen of your tax dollars ($13 per week), making you feel so good about yourself [stimulated], that you want to run out to Wal-Mart and buy a new Chinese-made HDTV and go home and watch Telemundo! Pray for our country.

Here's the good news though - Obama took Air Force One to Denver to sign the stimulus package, wasting as much as 10,000 gallons of fuel OR 24 JOBS FOR ONE YEAR. Don't you just love hypocrites?

Obama went to the International Olympic Committee to have them choose Chicago for a host city, he failed.

Obama went to Copenhagen to lecture them on global warming, he failed.

Obama went to new Jersey to promote the Democratic candidate for governor, he failed.

Obama went to Virginia to promote the Democratic candidate for governor, he failed.

Obama went to Massachusetts to promote the Democratic candidate for senator, he failed.

Speaking of praying, Obama has now been president for a full year and yet he & wife (first lady) Michelle, the Christian family they claim to be, have not attended church since the inauguration. Obama is the 1st president in history who did not attend any Christmas religious observance. He must miss Reverend Wright!

And finally, he is the 1st president to remain on vacation after a terrorist attack.

In these times 'I'll keep my God, my freedom, my gun and my money. Anyone that supports this insanity can keep "THE CHANGE".

I have to say... Amen.

The good news is that so many Americans are paying attention.