The 'smaller' rally down the street

For posterity purposes, this was the 'smaller' rally down the street:

Damn straight!

No pun intended.

Rally Round the Biden

Everyone who dropped out of the Democratic primaries is getting ready to endorse the Joe Biden candidacy.

Coincidence?  Of course not.

Will it help Biden overcome Sanders?  Yes but not enough for sleepy Joe to win.

Tea Party - Jan 3, 2011

As far as I know, there aren't any Tea Parties on the immediate horizon. I hope I'm wrong about that. Maybe I haven't been looking in the right places. What I do know is that there are a few reasons that the Tea Parties need to continue. Just because the Republicans won, doesn't mean the need for Tea Parties has stopped. Consider the following points;

• The Republicans need to remember they are on borrowed time to prove themselves. They needn't be worried about being held responsible for blockage coming from Democrats or the President. They need to be held accountable for their new majority in congress.
• As many are pointing out, the campaign for President in 2012 started on November 3rd. The Tea Parties didn't win as big a victory in the Senate as in Congress. The Executive branch is an even bigger prize, which means it will require even more work. That means Tea Parties need an earlier start than in the previous cycle.
• Keeping Tea Parties in the public eye will stop it from becoming yesterday's news or a forgotten movement. Having nothing on the horizon does not look good.
• When the new Congress is sworn in a Tea Party rally would prove to those in Washington that the movement is not to be ignored now that the election is over. That means, in contrast to the note above about Republicans, that Democrats should take notice too.
• It also helps destroy the myth that the Tea Party movement is not just a re-branding of conservative Republican voters but that the purpose of the movement is to put everyone in Washington on notice that the voters are not just Republicans but rather concerned citizens of all stripes.

There's ample reason to do this, not the least of which is the reason it started in the first place - government debt, government intrusion and government  over-reach.  So, disparate Tea Party organizers, next rally, DC, Jan 3rd, 2011? What do you say?

Jon Stewart Rally? Yawn.

Really, no links, no thoughts, no writing about it, because it is a distraction from stories that merit coverage.

Like this one.

John Stewart rally to fool the youth of America - I've already spent too many words on it.

Jon Stewart's hypocritical 'cause'

I decided a while ago to not spend too much time on entertainers and their myopic views on the politics of the nation.  Mostly, their views are irrelevant and unimportant. Typically, they are not highly informed.  Of course there are exceptions.  One can be highly informed, and still be wrong though. The real problem is, they often are given weight far beyond their true value.  I find myself needing to comment on one Jon Stewart today.  

CODE RED D.C. Rally NOON TODAY

If you can make it to the rally at noon, it's pretty much your civic duty to attend.

The Kennedy rally has begun

Democratic Representative Carol Shea-Porter arguing that the Constitution doesn't cover health care, misses the point - the Constitution doesn't cover a lot of stuff but there are some basic concepts it does cover that should not be cast aside.



And Howard Dean goes on the offensive; the health care bill WILL contain a government paid option. Oh yes, it will.



This is just the start of the Democrat blowback, and they still have the overall numbers. Not to mention the legislative option of reconciliation.  Don't let the Town Hall momentum slide or this boondoggle will still get passed.

Rally 'round the Kennedy

Let me start by offering condolenses to the Kennedy family. A loss of a family member is always a sorrowful event.

Democrats are looking to revive Obamacare KennedyCare around the memory and the greatest wish of Ted Kennedy.  It's awfully difficult to not look at it as opportunism.  It's awfully difficult to not to mention some of the less than stellar Ted Kennedy initiatives.  And it's awfully difficult to not think of Mary Jo Kopechne.

But before the end of the first day, there's a rally cry around Ted.

"You've heard of 'win one for the Gipper'? There is going to be an atmosphere of 'win one for Teddy,'" Ralph G. Neas, the CEO of the liberal National Coalition on Health Care, told ABC News.

Inappropriate. Opportunistic. Desperate.

If Democrats believe that all it takes to rally support for a bad idea is a death of a liberal stalwart, then no wonder they find themselves in the shape they are in with this health care debacle.  It won't change the minds of those with legitimate concerns.  And it won't rally the faithful who have been M.I.A. in this battle.  Youths don't care too much about health care.  Blue Dog Democrats don't care about Kennedy's legacy - they care about re-election.

While it might generate some temporary sympathy, it likely won't move any poll numbers.  Nor should it.  A death is a death.  Kennedy is not a martyr for the cause - to try to turn him into one is cheap, tawdry and disrespectful - even if it was Ted's wish, this is simply not respectable.

Market rebound: real? Obama's?

A lot of people are wondering if the stock market rally or rebound of the last six weeks is real or not.  Not real in the sense of 'did it actually happen?' but rather in the sense that is it sustainable?  Is it a bear bounce (a blip on a downward trajectory)?

Or is it just this?

Or rather, is it really the beginning of a sustained recovery?  There's valid points to be made for both sides.  There are signs that the worst is past, and signs that the worst is yet to come.  If you had a crystal ball right now you could make yourself quite wealthy.  The truth is no one knows for sure.  Economics has been described as trying to drive your car using only your rear view mirror as your visual input.  You can tell what happened, but you don't know for sure if there's a big curve up ahead.  You have to react to clues from the past.

But there's a political point that is critical not to be overlooked.  If the recovery has started already then how did it happen?  All that you can be sure of is this - it wasn't because of the stimulus package (the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act).  Most of that money hasn't made it anywhere yet.  So if the recovery kicks into high gear, it won't be because of anything the Democrats and the President have done.  That's important to understand and to remember, because they will surely try to take credit for it.  

The BIG financial corollary to this point is that if the ARRA money is not needed, kill it before that money makes it's way into the system and stimulates massive inflation and tilts the economy into another problem.  There is a huge risk here that the Democrats will be undoing the decades of low stable, inflation rates that managed to be achieved during the Reagan administration and stayed quite stable through the Bush 41 administration, 2 Clinton terms, and 2 Bush 43 terms.

The market is up over 20% in the last month and a half.  If it's a bear bounce, it's a substantial one.  Recovery may be on it's way.  After all the conventional wisdom is that steep recessions are shorter than shallow recession.  This one was certainly steep - at least by the time it became known (arguably the recession started in 2007).  The most important thing to remember however is that if that is the case, the recovery pre-dates Obama's massive spend.  And if that's true he must be denied credit for it or it will just lead to more of the same spend your way to recovery thinking.

Ironically, America does need change.  The problem is that it is still somewhat blind to the type of  change that is really needed.  The President believes his change is the right change but what America needs changing is in it's thinking.  It needs in many quarters to lose it's sense of entitlement.  It needs jobs. It needs manufacturing.  It needs to have a better mix of consumer, investment and research and development spending.  It needs to curb it's current account deficit with real and fair free trade deals and competitive domestic products.  It needs to mitigate it's dependence on foreign energy through use of domestic drilling, nuclear power, natural gas, and clean coal technology.  Sure throw in solar, battery, geothermal, and wind power but don't expect them to pay off by 2012 or 2030 - they won't.  

Most importantly America needs to slash it's government debt at all levels.  This will not get done with trillions more in federal debt. It requires the killing or massive overhaul of discretionary and non-discretionary spending.  In other words Medicare, Medicaid, Social Security and possibly defense spending (though preferably not the latter).  All that incremental Obama debt might do effectively is potentially reduce state debts. In case some states decide they want to secede from the mess the union is in a few years down the road, they'll be in a healthier position to do so.  Wonderful.  What a great way to destroy America from the inside.  Maybe that's been the plan of the ultra-left all along?  Nah, couldn't be.