US Congress Passes Bill Recognizing Israel's Right to Defend Itself

Friday, January 09, 2009

US Congress Passes Bill Recognizing Israel's Right to Defend Itself

The US House Of Representatives overwhelmingly passed a resolution today that recognizes Israel's right to defend its people,something that undoubtedly flew in the face of the recent travesty in the UN, and probably had Condi Rice shaking her head.

The vote was 390 to 5.

Meanwhile,neither Hamas or Israel accepted the idea of a ceasefire. Hamas fired thirty rockets from Gaza City into Israel today,while the Israelis closed in on Hamas targets.

The IDF is focusing on Jebalya in the northern half of the Gaza Strip, which shows that the Tzahal has no problem mixing it up in Gaza city's warren of alleys. They're notgoing tosimply walk in blind, and I don't doubt they'll have a few unpleasant surprises for the Green Hat guys.

Another target the IDF is focusing on is Rafah,the key to control of the Egyptian border, the Philadelphi Corridor and the arms smuggling tunnels.

Obama's Spooky Speech...

I've pretty much refrained from much criticism of president-in-waiting Barack Hussein Obama lately.

One of the most unpatriotic and frankly disgusting displays in American politics I've ever seen were the tantrums the Angry Left threw after George W. Bush was elected and then re-elected in 2004, and I had pretty much resolved to be better than that and not snipe at our new president until he took office, settled in and actually did something I disagreed with. We only have one president at a time, after all. And unlike some of Obama's critics on both the Left and Right, I respect him for saying so, and whether it came from sincere conviction or whether he simply wasn't sure what to say, he was exactly right.

But yesterday, Obama chose to give a widely reported speech on America's economy and his plans for it, and frankly it was ..well, spooky.

Here we have a situation where investors are panicked,where unemployment is over 7% and jobs are being shed like the autumn leaves, where there is a wide perception of corruption and cronyism in the financial sector, in Congress and the Federal government.

And Obama's solution? First of all, scare the peons even more by yakking it up about what a dire situation it is. ..none of that 'the only thing we have to fear is fear itself ' FDR-type rhetoric for the One!Second, declare that America will spend its way out of this and that BIG, BIG goverment is the only solution, along with a trillion dollar stimulus program funded by deficit spending.

Isn't that exactly what's been going on since October? And as consumers and the market reacted, things have gotten worse.

It sincerely makes me wonder whether the president-elect has been living in a cave for the last few months, that he somehow failed to notice that his economic plan for America is a prescription that has already been tried and actually made the patient sicker.

Big government, you see, does not create prosperity.If it did, the Soviets would have won the Cold War hands down. Government can enable properity by lowering taxes and regulations and instituting sound monetary and trade policies, but by it's very nature government does its best workbeing small and unobtrusive. What creates prosperity is commerce, low taxes, manufacturing and free markets.

If you look behind the platitudes,Obama, by contrast, wants to make government bigger and make it the engine of employment..and he'll pay for it all by simply adding to the deficit and spiking inflation by turning on the printing presses and printing more money.

Even a crack dealer would understand that as a recipe for economic disaster, and it's been a massive failure everywhere it's been tried.

All of his ideas aren't wacky. The concept of allowing business write downs to go back five years retroactively ain't bad, and neither is the idea of investing in infrastructure...provided we can afford it.

Or to put it in terms that every American family has had to deal with: If we want that, what are we prepared to cut back on to be able to afford it and not go broke?

Rather than cut back on government to afford infrastructure,Obama is going to borrow other people's money in order to afford both.

Unfortunately,unless his speech was mere political verbiage, that either makes him malignant or clueless. And either way, that's dangerous.

Blago Impeached By Illinois House

Yes, they finally did it. And here's something even more astonishing..this is the first governor the Illinois House has ever voted to impeach!

Now it goes to the State Senate.

I have to say that judging by a number of people in the Illinois legislature, it's definitely people-in-glass-houses-throwing-rocks time. Blago's real crime was getting caught and embarrassing people.