I have a new piece up at Hudson New York, on newspeak.  It's here.

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TUESDAY,  APRIL 7,  2009

THE STEVENS DISGRACE - AT 8:20 P.M. ET: 

WASHINGTON (AP) -- A seething federal judge dismissed the corruption conviction of former Alaska Sen. Ted Stevens on Tuesday and took the rare and serious step of ordering a criminal investigation into prosecutors who poisoned the case.

''In nearly 25 years on the bench, I've never seen anything approaching the mishandling and misconduct that I've seen in this case,'' U.S. District Judge Emmet Sullivan said.

Sullivan appointed a special prosecutor to investigate Justice Department lawyers who repeatedly withheld evidence from defense attorneys and the judge during the monthlong trial. Stevens was convicted in October of lying on Senate forms about home renovations and gifts he received from wealthy friends.

COMMENT:  The moral of this story is that whenever you give power to government you must watch it carefully.  We law-and-order types must be just as sensitive to prosecutorial misconduct as we are to judges who let the guilty off easily.  We should recall the nightmare of the child-abuse cases in the 1980s, when many innocent people went to jail for "child abuse" that never occurred.  That scandal was exposed by conservative columnist Dorothy Rabinowitz, of The Wall Street Journal.

But I don't know where Senator Stevens goes to get his life back.

April 7, 2009  Permalink

HANSON ON OBAMA'S LAMENT - AT 7:45 P.M. ET:  Reader Ray Cleveland alerts us to Victor Davis Hanson's comment on the Obama Appalling Apology Tour (my term) of Europe.  Hanson says:

In this great age of atonement, in a mere two or three days the world has been reminded that (1) the U.S. has been arrogant; (2) dismissive and derisive to Europe; (3) was a slave-owning society; (4) practiced genocide against native Americans; (5) did not let blacks vote; (6) was the only nation to have used nuclear weapons; (7) embraced torture; (8) alienated the world under Bush, and on and on. The subtext has been that those of a different race, of a different era, or under a different president have done terrible things, which I, from my own moral Olympus, must now apologize for.

Yes.  Perfection has spoken, and its name is Barack.  Hanson goes on:

A modest suggestion: from now on, every president who wishes to go abroad and review all his lesser citizens' collective past and present sins, with accompanying apologies — to applause from foreigners — must first, in the spirit of New Testament atonement, review his own regrettable transgressions.

And then the sins of Barack are listed - taking campaign funds from AIG; smoking, snorting cocaine, hangin' with Rev. Wright, making disparaging remarks about working-class Pennsylvanians, and joking about the Special Olympics.

I think many of us could add to that list.  Read the piece.  You'll like it.

April 7, 2009  Permalink

3:45 p.m. ET:  I just returned from a Hudson Institute meeting, which is why you haven't heard from me. 

DOW CLOSE - AT 4:01 P.M. ET:  The Dow closed down 187, to 7789 (preliminary figures).  The rally of the past weeks appears to have fizzled.

OBAMA IN IRAQ - AT 3:54 P.M. ET:  The president has made a quick trip to visit troops in Iraq, the right thing to do.  From the Washington Post: 

BAGHDAD, April 7 -- President Obama made a previously unannounced trip to Iraq on Tuesday, his first as commander in chief, and drew wild cheers from U.S. troops when he declared that it was time for Iraqis to "take responsibility for their country."

Obama made the comment in a brief speech to U.S. troops who greeted him at al-Faw Palace after he arrived at Baghdad International Airport following a trip to Europe and Turkey.

"You have given Iraq the opportunity to stand on its own as a democratic country," Obama said. "That is an extraordinary achievement, and for that you have the thanks of the American people."

COMMENT:  The man actually came close to saying that our mission in Iraq has been successful.  What will the American left say?  Will all his commencement addresses be cancelled?  How can he say a thing like that?  Shameful, shameful.

April 7, 2009  Permalink

COME HOME ALREADY - AT 8:37 A.M. ET:  The president is about to return to Washington from his tour of Europe, where he was treated like a rock star.  Unlike rock stars, though, he didn't bring home much from the tour.  He did, however, leave a number of apologies for the United States and he demonstrated what groveling, when practiced by a pro, could be like. 

Here's a late gem from the president, currently in Turkey, as reported by The New York Times:

“I am personally committed to a new chapter in American engagement,” Mr. Obama told the students, who sat in a tight circle around him. “We can’t afford to talk past one another and focus only on our differences, or to let the walls of mistrust go up around us.”

Setting out his perspective on America’s relationship with the Islamic world, Mr. Obama told the Turkish Parliament on Monday that: “America’s relationship with the Muslim community, the Muslim world, cannot and will not just be based upon opposition to terrorism,” he said. “We seek broader engagement based upon mutual interest and mutual respect.”

COMMENT:  When precisely was this not the case?  Right after the 9-11 attacks, President Bush went to a mosque to show respect and draw a distinction between Islam and radical Islam.  The press now chooses not to remember. 

April 7, 2009   Permalink

THE WARS OF WASHINGTON - AT 8:03 A.M. ET:  From The Washington Times: 

Defense Secretary Robert M. Gates Monday unveiled a sweeping $534 billion budget proposal that shifts priorities from conventional warfare to counterinsurgency, but it is already provoking opposition from some key lawmakers worried about losing more jobs in a deep recession.

The budget for 2010 would cap production of the F-22 fighter jet and reduce funds for missile defense and other big-ticket items, but more than double unmanned craft used in targeting militants in Afghanistan and Pakistan.

COMMENT:  The concern in Congress goes well beyond jobs.  There's real concern about cutting missile defense, especially right after the North Koreans provoked us again. 

The Gates proposals will go through many congressional hearings.  Gates is trying to reform the unreformable, the Pentagon's antiquated and sluggish procurement system, which has defied logic and streamlining for years.  Even the most ardent pro-defense officials, like the late Sen. Barry Goldwater, have been enraged by it.  So we wish the secretary well on that.  As for his specific choices, we reserve judgment until hearings are held and all the arguments are presented.  We have made both good and bad choices in the past.  With today's costs, we can't afford many more bad ones.

April 7, 2009   Permalink

OBAMA BASHES BUSH - AGAIN - AT 7:17 A.M. ET:

ISTANBUL, Turkey (AP) -- President Barack Obama says it will take time for the world to see how he is leading America in a different direction from his predecessor.

Obama reminded students in Turkey that he opposed the war in Iraq that was started by then-president George W. Bush.

But Obama also said Tuesday that as president he must withdraw U.S. troops in a careful way that doesn't lead Iraq to ''a complete collapse into violence.''

COMMENT:  No, I don't think it will take much time, Mr. President.  Firm resolution has given way to mush.  We can begin there.

Also, President Bush didn't spend his first months in office bashing his predecessor, and never did so on foreign soil.  This may play well for a time, but I suspect more alert foreign ministries around the world wonder whether they can depend on an American president who has so much negative to say about his own country. 

Sometimes the president seems not to realize that he's won the election and that he's not living in the leftist precincts of Hyde Park, Chicago, any longer.

April 7, 2009   Permalink

ANOTHER PROBE? - AT 7:10 A.M. ET:  From The Wall Street Journal:

WASHINGTON -- An Internal Revenue Service official warned nonprofits to be mindful of executive-compensation practices amid public ire over large bonuses at insurer American International Group Inc. and other Wall Street firms that have received federal aid.

Lois Lerner, the IRS's director of tax-exempt organizations, told a gathering of lawyers representing charities Monday that scrutiny of nonprofits' pay practices is likely to increase. Nonprofit leaders should be sure to practice due diligence in making sure their executive pay can be justified through data on comparable practices at similar organizations, she said.

"If you're not looking, we're looking," Ms. Lerner said at Georgetown University Law Center's Representing & Managing Tax-Exempt Organizations conference here.

The IRS has intensified oversight of charities recently, through reports and an overhaul of nonprofits' annual tax form.

COMMENT:  John McCain once said that all causes eventually become businesses.  We have to be uneasy that, once again, the federal government is stepping into the private sector to examine private decisions.  At the same time, there have been appropriately raised eyebrows about the pay scales of some "nonprofits."  (I put it in quotes because some of the "executives" make hefty profits.)  The nonprofit sector should have cleaned itself up years ago, and the boards of directors of nonprofits should be practicing tighter oversight. 

I assume "nonprofits" includes universities.  Someone, preferably a team of tough investigate journalists, should examine the way they spend some of the contributions they solicit each year.  The team might also examine the sources of some of those contributions, like the Saudi government, which spends tens of millions each year to buy influence in the American educational system.  How much have you read about that in the mainstream media?

April 7, 2009  Permalink 

THE GENERAL DEMOTED - AT 6:58 A.M. ET:

April 6 (Bloomberg) -- General Motors Corp. is speeding up preparations for a possible bankruptcy filing even as directors seek deeper savings this week to avoid that outcome, people familiar with the plans said.

The bankruptcy readiness focuses on forming a new company from GM’s best assets if necessary, said the people, who asked not to be named because the matter is private. The cost-cut discussions center on how to go beyond GM’s proposal to slash debt by 46 percent and shed 47,000 jobs in 2009, and will include talks with Treasury officials, the people said.

COMMENT:  I suspect that this is leaking out now to soften the blow, and the psychological impact on the economy, when it happens.

April 7, 2009   Permalink

MONDAY,  APRIL 6,  2009

MORE GROWN-UP THINKING - AT 6:27 P.M. ET:  Bill Kristol, in tomorrow's Washington Post, will deflate President Obama's rather simplistic arguments about creating a world without nuclear weapons:

...to justify a world without nuclear weapons, what Obama would really have to envision is a world without war, or without threats of war. That's an ancient vision. It's one reason American presidents have tried to encourage the spread of liberal democracy and responsible regimes around the world.

But, of course, Obama's crowd ridiculed those efforts.

But we have a long way to go before achieving a world of pacific liberal regimes. George W. Bush's hope for a world without tyranny is the necessary -- though perhaps still not the sufficient -- precondition to a world without nuclear weapons. The danger is that the allure of a world without nuclear weapons can be a distraction -- even an excuse for not acting against real nuclear threats.

One of those threats is Iran, which Obama discussed in his Prague speech on nuclear disarmament:

"We want Iran to take its rightful place in the community of nations, politically and economically. We will support Iran's right to peaceful nuclear energy with rigorous inspections. That's a path that the Islamic Republic can take. Or the government can choose increased isolation, international pressure, and a potential nuclear arms race in the region that will increase insecurity for all."

Obviously, Obama recommends the first path. But notice what he didn't do:

He didn't say that a nuclear-armed Iranian regime is unacceptable. He didn't express a commitment to preventing such an outcome, or confidence that the United States and international community would prevent such an outcome. He simply suggested that it wouldn't be optimal for Iran to choose that outcome. And if the rulers of the Islamic republic disagree? In the very speech in which Obama outlined his vision of a world without nuclear weapons, he weakened America's stand against Iran's nuclear weapons program.

So while Obama talks of a future without nuclear weapons, the trajectory we are on today is toward a nuclear- and missile-capable North Korea and Iran -- and a far more dangerous world.

COMMENT:   Very well said.  Please read the whole piece.  We are making one concession after another, and getting nothing in return.  And that's why we all should worry...a great deal.

April 6, 2009   Permalink

DOW CLOSE - AT 4:12 P.M. ET:  The Dow closed down 42 points, to 7976, an indifferent day.

OH NO - AT 3:42 P.M. ET - Hat tip on this one to John Hinderaker at Power Line.  From Bloomberg:

At a news conference afterward, Obama said his debut on the international stage had convinced him that “political interaction in Europe is not that different from the United States Senate,” where he served before entering the White House.

“There’s a lot of -- I don’t know what the term is in Austrian -- wheeling and dealing, and people are pursuing their interests, and everybody has their own particular issues and their own particular politics,” he said in response to an Austrian reporter’s question.

COMMENT:  Will someone inform our worldly, cultured, smarter-than-anyone president that there's no language called Austrian.  Austrians speak German, and that included native son Adolf Hitler, of recent fame.  Let's introduce the president to Austrian stuff.  Maybe he can see "The Sound of Music" or something.

Can you imagine the reaction if Bush had said that?

April 6, 2009   Permalink

SPIN ON - AT 3:18 P.M. ET:  Some of the dovish persuasion are trying to spin yesterday's North Korean rocket launch as a failure.  Nothing to worry about.  Nothing to see.  Please move on.  But the facts may well be very different:  From AP, via Fox News:

SEOUL, South Korea — North Korea's rocket may have fallen into the sea, but military experts cautioned Monday against calling it a complete failure, pointing out that it traveled twice as far as any missile the country has launched.

Although the distance was still far short of showing North Korea could reach U.S. territory, it rattled the North's neighbors and countries around the globe, with the U.S. and its allies pushing for quick punishment at an emergency U.N. Security Council meeting held hours after the launch.

The launch, which demonstrated progress, is a particularly worrying development for a belligerent country that says it has nuclear weapons and once threatened to turn Seoul into a "sea of fire."

COMMENT:  A former Air Force general and missile expert said on Fox TV today that to dismiss this test as a failure misses the point.  Each test advances the North Korean program.  Things are learned.  And the range of the North Korean missiles is obviously increasing.  Soon they will be a threat to the western United States.

April 6, 2009   Permalink

DOW NOW - AT 11:38 A.M. ET:  The Dow is down 104, to 7915.

BULLETIN - AT 9:47 A.M. ET:  The president has spoken to the Turkish parliament.  Most of his speech was boilerplate.  You know - we are not at war with Islam, we want a good relationship with Muslim countries, Islam has enriched the world.  Pretty much George Bush stuff. 

But there were two curious things:  First, Mr. Obama once again endorsed Turkey's entry into the European Union, one day after he was slapped down by Nicolas Sarkozy and Angela Merkel for saying just that.  The European Union's entry requirements are really not our business.  Why did the president feel it necessary to rub France and Germany's noses in it once more?  Is it simply because he was in Turkey and wanted to make nice?  His behavior reminds me of the line from a song in "Finian's Rainbow" - "If I'm not near the girl I love, I love the girl I'm near."  The man just can't help going for that love.

And then there was this, which will create major buzz on the internet, as reported by The New York Times:

“The United States has been enriched by Muslim-Americans,” Mr. Obama said. “Many other Americans have Muslims in their family, or have lived in a Muslim-majority country. I know, because I am one of them.”

And then he paused. And waited. And, after about five seconds, as the translator caught up, the applause came.

It was a politically risky line for Mr. Obama to use because back at home, there remains chatter, particularly on right-wing internet Web sites, that accuse Mr. Obama of being Muslim, and may try to interpret that line as proof of those views.

I'm not sure that will happen, but you'd think, considering the sensitivity of the issue, that the president could have been more clear.  When he says, "I am one of them," I assume he means that he has Muslims in his family (true) and has lived in a Muslim-majority country (Indonesia).  But the sloppiness will ignite the buzz machine.  He should have said, "Many other Americans have Muslims in their family, as I do, or have lived in a Muslim-majority country, as I have."  Much clearer. 

Oh, by the way, Mr. Obama did get in the required grovel line.  After discussing the delicate issue of Turkey's genocide of Armenians in 1915, the president said, "“Our country still struggles with the legacy of our past treatment of Native Americans.”

Again, he can't help himself.

April 6, 2009   Permalink

 
EXHIBIT A - AT 8:25 A.M. ET:  The Washington Times, in an editorial today, makes a telling point about Mr. Obama's trip to Europe, and some of the wisdom he exuded there:

The president quixotically says that a further U.S.-Russian nuclear drawdown will give the United States "greater moral authority to say to Iran, 'Don't develop a nuclear weapon,' to say to North Korea, 'Don't proliferate nuclear weapons.' " This is a charming notion, but it displays shocking ignorance of the strategic rationale driving countries toward creating or expanding their nuclear arsenals.

COMMENT:  It sure does.  The idea that the U.S. needs more moral authority to talk to a regime that is the world's greatest sponsor of terror is absurd.  It's the kind of over-intellectualization and super-rationalization that we're getting from the Obama crowd.  It is worrying.

April 6, 2009   Pemalink

AND NOW FOR THE GROWN-UP WORLD - AT 7:35 A.M. ET:  The president is about to address the Turkish parliament.  This should really be rich, as Turkey is a Muslim country.  The opportunity for high grovel is so tempting.  The president has already bowed down physically to one Muslim leader, the king of Saudi Arabia, as you've seen in a widely circulated photo.  We can't wait to hear what honors are about to be bestowed on other aggrieved Muslims. 

This, from the Washington Post, should put the president's current excursion in Europe into some perspective:

As Obama prepared to address the Turkish parliament Monday, the U.N. Security Council met in an emergency session. Despite the urging of the United States and Japan, the 15-member council could not agree on a statement criticizing North Korea's rocket launch. China and Russia said they were not yet convinced that Pyongyang had violated any U.N. rules, according to council officials.

Remember all that palling around that Obama did with Russia's Medvedev last week?  Remember the smiles?  Remember the talk about "resetting" our relationship with Moscow?  Remember the pledge to start negotiating a new nuclear weapons treaty?  Remember the warmth and the good times?  Oh, and also the swell food.

Lot of good it did us.  The old reds won't even admit that North Korea broke any rules.  Security Council resolutions?  Did you see any resolutions?  Maybe the secretary-general's dog ate them.  That must be it.

We got stiffed at the UN yesterday.  North Korea didn't even get a slap on the wrist.  It serves as a metaphor for Mr. Obama's entire trip, with The One accompanied by 500 well-chosen staffers.  Sure, they loved him.  They loved Michelle.  They loved everybody.  They loved the plane.  And, in the end, we got very little, bordering on nothing.  NATO committed a closet full of troops to Afghanistan and said nice things.  But, even yesterday, French President Sarkozy rather bluntly told Mr. Obama to butt out of Europe's internal business after the president suggested that the European Union admit Turkey, a sensitive subject.  Angela Merkel joined in.  Even the warmth didn't outlive the trip.

When will some Americans learn that The Obamas' personal popularity will not translate into policy?  Nations have their own interests.  You can be invited to their party, but don't expect the keys to the kingdom.

In fact, the trip may backfire.  Rasmussen reports that, even after the media did its part, as a division of Obamaland, to portray the trip as sublime, Obama's poll numbers have not shot up at home.  Rasmussen also reported that a majority of Americans want a military response to North Korea, something the Ivy League crowd around Obama probably didn't expect.

I'm reminded of something that George Shultz, President Reagan's secretary of state, once said:  "Negotiations are a euphemism for capitulation if the shadow of power is not cast across the bargaining table."  The president should mount that quote on his desk.  Throughout the trip he has appeared more the neophyte than the leader, more the apprentice than the president.  His trip came at a moment when the Pentagon is preparing widely publicized budget cuts.  It came at a moment when the phrase, "the war on terror," has been dropped from administration vocabulary.  It came at a moment when the administration flashes "weakness" rather than strength.  And, of course, the president spent an embarrassing amount of time this last week apologizing for America's sins, real or imagined, mostly imagined.  There was no shadow of power.  There was only the shadow of a kid playing in the sandbox.

Sure, I'm proud that we can show off our first African-American president.  And Michelle Obama conducted herself with great dignity.  Sure, I like it that crowds cheer a president, rather than boo him.  But these things are on the surface.  Europe despised Ronald Reagan, but he saved them and was the key figure in removing the Soviet threat.  The Europeans liked Bill Clinton, in part because they could sucker him into a war in the Balkans that Europe should have fought itself.  They loathed George W. Bush, but the America Europe depends on was kept safe by Mr. Bush, something his successor refuses to acknowledge.  Indeed, one waited for a single word from President Obama acknowledging the contributions of his predecessor, something that common sense should have dictated.  We continue to wait.

We noticed that the president has resorted to a speech style reminiscent of Ted Sorensen's speeches for Jack Kennedy.  I call it see-saw rhetoric.  You know it:  "Let us never negotiate out of fear. But let us never fear to negotiate."  That sort of thing.  So, in his speech calling for nuclear disarmament, the president pledged this nation to that goal, but cautioned that, in the interim, he would not unilaterally disarm this country.  We want to disarm, but we won't do it alone.  Now, that's fine, but the key question is where the president's heart lies.  Will he be fierce in defending this nation, as Ronald Reagan was, or will he be faint-hearted, while negotiating questionable treaties?  No American president was more interested in arms control than was President Reagan - something not widely known.  But his interest marched side by side with the most significant strengthening of American defense that we saw during the Cold War.

Some say that Mr. Obama's approach, on bended knee, is simply a tactic, hiding real policies that are tougher.  Some even say that his actual policies are similar to those of George W. Bush.  I hope so.  The final judgment is certainly not in.  And we recall that Jack Kennedy's first year in office was marked by weakness and foreign failures, but that his second was far better.  However, I do hope the president realizes from this past week that campaigning and governing are entirely different, and that the road show will wear thin, especially here at home, in the absence of gains for the United States.  And he might, in his speeches, occasionally throw in words like "democracy," "victory" and, yes, even "Americanism," to remind foreign nations that his address is Washington, and not the world.

We await his address to the Turkish parliament. 

April 6, 2009   Permalink